BURLINGAME, California (Crown) — August and September are the quietest months of the NBA calendar, but at a San Francisco Bay Area gym, it’s when players gather to hone their craft. A group of players, from college students to NBA players, came to Unlimited Potential Basketball in Burlingame one August afternoon to test their skills against each other.
“It’s usually just a text,” he said. Oklahoma City Thunder star Jalen Williams“Hey, come to the Bay.”
Williams, who lives in Arizona during the offseason, took a 1.5-hour flight to join the practice that day. He played games with players like Gradey Dick of the Toronto Raptors, Alex Sarr And Jordan Poole of the Washington WizardsAnd Amen Thompson of the Houston Rockets.
I spent some time on the peninsula last week. A truly special community building experience @UPBTraining. Tonight (Monday) at 10:45 p.m. on @kron4news we’ll have the story of Unlimited Potential Basketball and how Packie Turner and his family made it a haven for basketball. pic.twitter.com/x6TqBvRQ4n
— Jason Dumas (@JDumasReports) August 26, 2024
These types of pickup matches featuring professionals are usually reserved for cities like New York, Las Vegas or Los Angeles. But after a few years of impromptu games at UPB, the gymnasium became a community.
“That’s really what I envisioned, was to mix the two,” said gym owner Packie Turner. “On the back field, you have a kid doing a private workout at the same time we have pros playing with college kids and everybody’s getting ready for their season. There’s a beauty in that, being able to see the progression of what you can do with that.”
Turner and his wife, Bianca, created UPB from the ground up. They wanted a safe space for players of all ages and skill levels to work on their game.
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The foundations are pure, but basketball is big business and trust has to be earned when basketball is your literal livelihood, as it is for the professionals who come to UPB.
“I trust Packie because I’ve worked with him for a long time, and every time I work on things with him, I feel like I’m getting better. Seeing those results makes me want to keep coming back,” said Sarr, who was selected No. 2 overall by the Washington Wizards in the 2024 NBA draft.
Williams, who played college football at Santa Clara, said Turner is familiar with his style of play, which helps him develop his game.
“We hit it off from our first training session. You can tell when people are sincere,” he said.
That kind of authenticity and knowledge helped Turner turn the peninsula into a Hooper home in August.
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