Yes, You Can Make a 150-Foot Basketball Shot With a Homemade Catapult

Daily Mail:

The Legendary Shots are a group of basketball fans who go to great lengths to get the ball in the net - literally.

The Alabama friends recently scored a basket from around 150 feet - potentially a new world record - but it was actually the method of the shot that pleased them more than the distance.

The nine-strong gang built a wooden catapult which they used to fire the ball across a street and through the rim.

Yahoo Sports:

The Alabama teens spent most of their winter break in January drawing a blueprint of a catapult they saw on YouTube, then constructing a giant wooden version powered by a pair of 110-pound garage springs. In addition to shelling out $300 for building materials, they borrowed power tools from their parents, painstakingly cut the wood at precisely the right angles and even painted a "Legendary Shots" logo on the side.

Actually sinking the shot turned out to be more difficult than constructing the catapult.

Because the catapult's accuracy was more scattershot than the Legendary Shots expected, it was rare for the ball to get within a foot or two of the rim. The group spent six Saturdays shooting for roughly seven hours a day at a nearby football stadium and in group founder Carson Stalnaker's backyard before finally sinking a shot on a bounce from roughly 50 yards away.

And here's a flashback video from the Legendary Shots YouTube vault: