JEDDAH, 3 April 2008 — The death of an American basketball player, who suffered a heart attack during a match on Tuesday, could have been avoided if medics had attended the match, said an official from the General Presidency of Youth Welfare (GPYW) in Jeddah.
Marvin Stone, who played for Ittihad, collapsed in a locker room at Jeddah’s Prince Abdullah Al-Faisal Stadium during halftime of a semifinal game against Ohud. Despite being asked to attend, medics from the Saudi Red Crescent failed to turn up at the match.
“We informed the Red Crescent about the match and requested doctors and an ambulance to be at hand. Even though we received an acknowledgement from them, they failed to show up,” informed Yusuf Al-Ghamdi, deputy director of GPYW.
“When they can’t turn up — usually because of a lack of staff — they let us know in advance. However, this time, there was no notification that they were not going to come for Tuesday’s match,” said another GPYW official.
He added that the organization had sent the Red Crescent three letters, one on Feb. 18 and two on March 17. However, an official from the Saudi Red Crescent denied having received any letter from GPYW.
Abdulrahman Al-Musaad, secretary-general of the Saudi Arabian Basketball Federation, said that it tells GPYW about matches, which in turn informs the Red Crescent.
Meanwhile, Stone’s team has offered to meet all expenses to fly the 26-year-old’s body to the US.
Apparently, the basketball player had a family history of heart diseases with his father dying at 47, a sister at 32 and a nephew at 26.
Fellow US team player, Abdul-Rauf, 39, said the team decided to continue the game after Stone was rushed to hospital because “we wanted to go out and play in the hope of winning it for him.” Abdul-Rauf added that the team got word at the end of the game that Stone had passed away. “Everybody took it real bad.”
Stone had recently signed a contract with Ittihad and was playing in the team’s Top Eight Playoffs semifinal on Tuesday night when he died.
Stone played professionally overseas and had recently completed the season with a team in Cyprus before signing a short-term contract with Ittihad.
