Not long after the Los Angeles Lakers defeated the Minnesota Timberwolves at Staples Center on Wednesday night, a senseless mass shooting broke out at Borderline Bar and Grill in Thousand Oaks, Calif.
The gunman allegedly began his attack by throwing smoke grenades into the establishment before firing rounds of bullets from a gun that used an illegal magazine. The killing spree injured several and killed 12 before the attacker took his own life.
Multiple Los Angeles sports franchises have taken action to provide for a community in despair, and on Saturday the Clippers and Milwaukee Bucks took the court for pregame warmups in t-shirts that read “Enough” across the chest and had the victims’ 12 names listed on the back.
According to Tania Ganguli of the L.A. Times, the Atlanta Hawks and Lakers will follow suit for their game:
On Sunday at Staples Center, before they play each other, Lakers and Atlanta Hawks players will don t-shirts with the word “Enough” on the front, and the names of the 12 people killed by a gunman in a Thousand Oaks bar printed on the back.
Lakers head coach Luke Walton addressed the incident and wildfires following a practice before the team boarded a flight for Sacramento. “It breaks my heart to have to do this again, but our thoughts, our prayers, our love, is with those people suffering from that senseless shooting a couple days ago,” he said.
“It’s got to stop. But it’s important that we always talk about it instead of just pushing it to the side. We love basketball, we’re here to play basketball, but there’s bigger things going on. Obviously, with the wildfires, too, hope that people’s homes are OK and that they’re going to be safe.”
The attack that shook up an otherwise quiet Southern California neighborhood came less than two weeks after 11 were killed in a mass shooting at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh.
