ZEELAND, Mich. — It's the shot heard around the world.
A video of Jules Hoogland, a junior at Zeeland East High School, making a shot in a basketball game has gone viral, because Hoogland is blind.
"I'm just going to go into the game and if I make it, I make it," Hoogland said she was thinking before the shot.
Before the game, she hadn't made a shot in practice. But once she hit the court for real, she banked in her second attempt.
"I was like, whoa, I did not expect that," says Hoogland. "And then the applause!"
The sold out crowd erupted into cheers, after being silent during the shot.
That's because Hoogland needs sound to know where the basket is. A friend used a stick to hit the backboard, giving Hoogland the auditory cue she needed.
"With the sound, it gives me an exact location of where the hoop is so then I know where to shoot," says Hoogland.
That method is one she and her coaches came up with last year.
And the silence of the crowd? That wasn't planned.
Ally Guffey, Hoogland's partner in the unified game where athletes with and without disabilities play together, says the crowd just knew.
"One of my teachers was telling me it's incredible how a classroom of 30 you can barely get to be quiet, but then a gym of over 2,000 students, within seconds, goes dead silent," says Guffey.
And those 2,000 in the gym aren't the only ones who saw the shot.
The video has since gone viral, with millions of views across several platforms, even being shared by ESPN. A feat Hoogland didn't expect, but is happy to be breaking misconceptions.
"That's what I have to do every day, I have to educate people," says Hoogland. "Because most people don't understand how I live my life. This is my normal, but they don't know what its like to be blind."
And inspiring everyone around her, even her own mom.
"She's taught me patience, she's taught me determination, she taught me compassion," says Jules's mother, Karen Hoogland. "She's a light. Her light shines brightly in our house and in our community."
And teaching them to never let anything hold them back.
"It can be challenging, but you just have to keep going," says Hoogland. "If it's something you love, don't give it up."
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