For eight years, shoe giant Nike backed Rick Lopez and his Colorado Hoopsters despite rumors – and later 55 criminal counts – alleging sexual relationships between the coach and some of his teenage players.
Now, five months after Lopez’s jail-cell suicide, the Hoopsters have slipped a notch and Nike is no longer sponsoring the team, having booted the Hoopsters from what the company calls its “elite youth basketball family” in April.
Nike officials refused to comment on their decision despite repeated requests. A Hoopsters leader is publicly playing down the end of the sponsorship, which comes as parents and players try to revive the once-mighty travel team.
“We’re still playing basketball. We’re still in the tournaments. We’re still moving forward,” said Pat Miller, a parent in a team management role. “I don’t see it as a huge issue.”
But a trail of e-mails from Miller and another Hoopsters parent to Nike describes the company as their “cornerstone supporter.” They plead for Nike to “do the right thing” by continuing its sponsorship. Many of those e-mails were unanswered.
On Feb. 10, Miller e-mailed Nike to ask why the company had been silent for seven months. “Although the Lopez situation has come to a tragic and unforeseen conclusion, I had hoped that we would see some positive results from our discussions by now,” Miller wrote to Mary Thompson, a member of Nike’s basketball sports marketing department.
That day, Miller e-mailed George Raveling, a former college basketball coach now affiliated with Nike: “It would be a tragedy to have Nike pull away during this rebuilding period.”
The e-mails sent in February and April also revealed a new crime. Before his arrest last summer, Lopez pocketed money the players’ parents had paid him for travel and tournament registration fees, Miller told Raveling via one of his e-mails. The Hoopsters’ families later had to pay again so their daughters could compete.
The original deal between Lopez and the Hoopsters remains cloudy. In 2003, Lopez told The Denver Post that Nike gave his team free shoes, bags and mesh uniforms – but did not pay the coach anything.
Thompson, who did not return a phone message for this story, also declined to give any details of the contract during a 2003 interview.
On April 25, Thompson revealed the company’s decision in a letter to Miller: “It is with great regret that Nike Women’s Basketball will go in a different direction.” A company spokesman, Rodney Knox, told The Post that Nike does not discuss sponsorship arrangements.
In the wake of the breakup, Miller is vowing to fill in the financial gap any way he can. In basketball terms, these also are tough times – several of the Hoopsters’ top players quit after Lopez was fired and arrested last summer.
“We’ve survived nine months without them and we’re going to continue,” Miller said of Nike dropping support.
Bill Briggs can be reached at 303-820-1720 or bbriggs@denverpost.com.
