Yarmulkes on the Basketball Court
College basketball may madden March, but high school players are making some news of their own — pioneering the latest craze in Jewish headgear. The Boca Raton-based Weinbaum Yeshiva High School Storm are wearing Klipped Kippahs at a Jewish basketball tournament in New York this week. Invented by their coach, Jon Kaweblum, the Klipped Kippah uses two sheitel clips — the kind normally sewn into wigs — on the inside of the kippah, so it stays put courtside.
The idea was born when local basketball officials in Boca Raton outlawed kippah-wearing during games, due to the danger of its accompanying hardware: angular bobby pins and hazardous metal clips that stick up as if gunning to gouge out an eye. Klipped Kippah solves this dilemma, but the trend’s functionality is further reaching than the sports arena.
“People will order one or two kipas online to try it out. Then, three weeks later, they’ll empty their drawers and send in 15 kipas to be ‘klipped,” Kaweblum told The Jewish Week.
The 18th annual Red Sarachek Tournament for Jewish high school basketball teams runs from March 26–30 at Yeshiva University.
Live broadcasts of the games can be found here.
