On Wednesday, February 27, the Memphis Grizzlies held the fourth annual Read to Achieve Celebration presented by International Paper at FedExForum to reward the top readers from each school that participated in the 2008 Memphis Grizzlies Reading Challenge. The top three schools that read the most minutes overall were given a plaque and a signed basketball from a Grizzlies player. Bruce Elementary came in first place with 1,125,616 minutes read, A.B. Hill Elementary came in a close second with 1,119,047 minutes read, and Grahamwood Elementary finished in third place with 355,369 minutes read. Collectively all 53 schools who participated read over four million minutes.

The Grizzlies All-Star Reading Team members, Javaris Crittenton, Rudy Gay, Casey Jacobsen, Mike Miller and Hakim Warrick, were on hand to speak to the students and participate in on-court contests with some of the students, while members of the Grizzlies Dance Team also entertained the crowd.

The festivities continued when one randomly selected student won four courtside tickets to the Grizzlies game on March 1 against Utah, which was the Kids Day Game. As part of the Kids Day celebrations, Brooks Hay was the junior public address announcer for the Kids Day Game, announcing the Grizzlies’ starting lineups during the pre-game introductions. During the game, five students from the winning class at Bruce Elementary participated in on-court games during timeouts.

Each student who attended the Read to Achieve Celebration received a Grizz Growth Chart and a piece of candy donated by Hershey to enjoy on their bus ride back to school. The Memphis Grizzlies are very proud of the student’s commitment to reading outside the classroom.

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