Jared Armstrong wants to create unity through basketball. The JAB Classic is his answer.
The Philadelphia native played professional basketball in Israel and experienced the dangers of the Hamas-led attacks in 2023. Now, he's starting a basketball tournament and Penn is his first stop.
The JAB Classic, a three-day pro-am basketball tournament, is looking to use sports as a way to foster unity.
JAB’s founder, Philadelphia native Jared Armstrong, brought the tournament to Penn following years of campus turmoil in the wake of the Hamas-led attacks on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, and the ensuing war in Gaza, which killed more than 70,000 Palestinian civilians.
“I just think [combating] the rise of hate,” Armstrong said. “Whether it’s racism, antisemitism, Islamophobia — it’s going to start with the next generation and really educating them. It’s more than just basketball for me.”
Penn, which was jolted into the national spotlight that year following the resignation of university president Liz Magill over backlash from her congressional testimony on antisemitism, saw a multitude of high-profile antisemitic incidents in the aftermath. In 2023, Penn Hillel was vandalized, a swastika was drawn inside of Weitzman School of Design, and a wall near a Jewish fraternity house was defaced with antisemitic graffiti.
» READ MORE: Jared Armstrong had to flee his dream job playing basketball in Israel | From 2023
Eighty-five percent of respondents from a 2025 Penn Hillel survey of Jewish students marked that they had “experienced, heard about, or witnessed” antisemitism at Penn.
Meanwhile, members of the Penn community who participated in pro-Palestinian protests received direct threats of violence, and an off-campus residence of pro-Palestinian students was controversially raided by Penn police officers, who said it was in connection to an alleged act of vandalism.
“This mission is really focused on college campuses,” Armstrong said. “We actually have an idea to just take it not to just Penn, but other campuses. That brings the mixture of the message. You know, sports, culture, entertainment all in one. So kids can understand the importance organically, not being forced to sit in the classroom.”
The eight-team tournament will tip off Friday and run through Sunday. Nine total games will be played over the weekend with Sunday boasting the Classic’s championship. Each team includes former and current NBA talent. Notable names participating include 76ers forward Dominick Barlow, two-time NBA champion Quinn Cook, two-time All-Star Victor Oladipo, and Philadelphia natives Markieff and Marcus Morris.
The first-place team will take home $1 million, though Armstrong noted he hopes the event’s mission will entice players to participate.
“Most athletes experience hate, whether it’s on or off the court,” Armstrong said. “We’re some of the most influential people in the world. I think every person in this tournament dealt with some sort of racism, and it’s not something new to us.”
Additionally, the tournament will feature two musical performances. On Friday, Philadelphia rapper KUR will perform between games three and four. On Sunday, prominent Chicago rapper G Herbo will take the Palestra’s court.
‘Supporting all kids’
Armstrong, a professional basketball player in Israel’s second division who played collegiately at Slippery Rock, was living in Ashkelon on Oct. 7, 2023, eight miles north of Gaza and the closest major city to the Gaza Strip.
With his life in danger and Hamas-led attacks getting closer to his residence, Armstrong fled to Tel Aviv alongside his teammates. Armstrong later returned home to Philadelphia.
When it was safe to go back to Israel to play, Armstrong witnessed the disarray the community was in. Looking to make a difference, he launched Jared Armstrong Basketball (JAB) Camp, a program that uses sports to teach children about prejudice. Additionally, Armstrong and JAB began renovating basketball courts in Israel and Philadelphia. To this day, 17 courts have been renovated, and this weekend’s classic will help fund another court in Philadelphia.
In the future, Armstrong is hoping to bring his mission to Gaza.
“[Palestinian children] are going through struggles that kids in Israel during the war are going through,” Armstrong said. “I’m big on supporting all kids. Regardless of your skin color, where you’re from. Like I said, just keep trying to inspire them, giving them some sort of hope, some sort of sanity, and just trying to give them some sort of peace.”
In the meantime, Armstrong is focused on helping heal the divide on Penn’s campus. A key figure in bringing JAB to the Palestra was Rev. Charles L. “Chaz” Howard, Penn’s university chaplain and vice president of social equity and community. Howard regularly holds interfaith dialogue on campus, focused on squashing prejudice.
“Penn is no island,” Howard said. “And the world has been a hard place the last several years.”
Howard believes events like the JAB Classic can help “stitch back together some of the brokenness” the community has felt in recent years. The timing also worked out. Many incoming freshmen and their families are in the city, with first-year student move-in slated for next week.
“I think what [Armstrong is] doing by using something like basketball as a dialogical space is brilliant,” Howard said. “It’s so simple, but it’s also brilliant. … And I’m a basketball man. So this is really exciting to me personally.”