All Vicky Demps could do was sit back and smile.

Somewhere, she knew her son would be doing the same.

“He’d love this,” Demps said of her son, R.J., a former standout guard for the Regis Jesuit Raiders who tragically passed away in a single-car accident in Missouri on December 21, 2011 as he was driving to the Kansas City airport to fly home to Colorado.

`This’ was the scene on July 7 at Regis Jesuit’s Guy Gibbs Gymnasium, as close to 30 basketball teams of up to five players took part in the first-ever R.J. Demps 3-on-3 Memorial Basketball Tournament. Three divisions (youth, adult recreation and adult competitive) of participants helped raise over $4,000 as Regis Jesuit, along with the Demps family, attempts to raise money in an effort to create a scholarship in R.J.’s name.

“This is great,” Vicky Demps said. Her husband, Reggie, and daughter, Briana, 13, were also in attendance. “I’m just trying to soak it all in. I’ve never felt more loved; there’s never enough words to express what this means to me.”

The idea for the tournament was a collaborative effort between the Demps family and the Regis Jesuit basketball community, led by Sue Shaw (wife of boys basketball coach, Ken Shaw) and Monica Ptasinski. The large turnout was a pleasant surprise for the organizers.

“We’re very excited by the turnout,” Sue Shaw said.

It’s clear that the name R.J. Demps still carries a lot of weight in and around the Regis Jesuit community. R.J. was one of the key cogs in the 2008-09 Raiders team that went on to win the school’s first state championship. R.J. parlayed his prep success into a collegiate career, as he was a junior at Benedictine College in Kansas at the time of his passing.

“Losing a kid like R.J. was real hard on the community,” said Regis Jesuit boys basketball coach, Ken Shaw, who also coached R.J. at Smoky Hill High School. “R.J. was a kid that always gave 100 percent effort. He was a leader and the other kids fed off of his energy. His attitude was infectious and he was very coachable.”

Ptasinski said that the 2008-09 team had a special bond.

Her son, Joey, was a member of that team, and was one of seven players that worked as a volunteer at the 3-on-3 tournament.

“They were all very close,” Ptasinski said. “They all wanted to be involved in this, some way.”

As the play on the court went on, Sue Shaw and Ptasinski were already cooking up new ideas and tweaks to the schedule for next year’s event.

“The first year is always the hardest,” Shaw said. “We’re really encouraged by the response and I think (the 3-on-3 tournament) can continue to grow from here.”