LONG BEACH, CA – Friday night’s first action in the 10th Pangos All-American Camp at Cabrillo High was a bit kinetic.
Saturday’s second day was no more less fast-paced but offered more clarity.
The Dinos Trigonis production had some no-shows and is short some players – including North Carolina-bound forward Isaiah Hicks, sitting in the bleachers due to an ankle injury incurred before he arrived in Southern California – who are hobbled.
But there is plenty of depth when it comes to quality prospects of the future mid- to high-major NCAA Division I quality.
Here are 10 players who impressed me Saturday (excluding the guys I wrote about in Friday night’s rundown):
*Conner Frankamp (6-foot-1/Class of 2013/Wichita, KS, North): Just a hunch – Kansas coach Bill Self could find some PT for this in-state Jayhawks’ recruit next season. But Self will have to wait a year because Frankamp has another season to go of carving up prep teammates. His crossover is the best in the camp. If opponents didn’t bite on that “killer crossover”, he rose up for jumpers from mid- to arc-range.
*Brandon Austin (6-6/2013/Philadelphia, PA, IMHOTEP): He is one of the multi-skilled players in the camp, with a slick set of handling and passing skills and a more than serviceable jump shot.
*Jordan Wilson (5-7/2013/Los Angeles, CA, Windward): There isn’t a quicker player in the California Class of 2013 and there might not be a quicker player in this camp, either. He’s an effortless jump shooter, as well, with range to nearly NBA arc territory.
*Geno Thorpe (6-3/2013/Pittsburgh, PA, Shaler): Thorpe – like Brandon Austin, he’s already committed to Penn State – has played as well as any “combo guard” in the camp. He’s quicker than he appears and just as strong as he looks.
*Jermaine Lawrence (6-8/2013/New Jersey Pope John XXXIII): Skilled, strong and explosive, Lawrence is the prototypical “skilled 4” of today’s hoops vernacular.
*Kevin Zabo (6-1/2014/Rockville, MD, Montrose Christian) and Casey Benson (6-2/2014/Tempe, AZ, Corona del Sol): Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls . . . here are two of the rising junior classes’ top point guard prospects.
*Stanley Johnson (6-5/2014/Santa Ana, CA, Mater Dei): Be it on short bursts to the rim or mid- to deep-range jumpers, Johnson has an extraordinary set of scoring tools and he’s putting them all to good use here.
*Ben Simmons (6-8/2015/Melbourne, Australia): He’s been the most productive of the current freshmen in the camp and looks every bit the part of the “next really good player to come out of Australia”.
*Isaiah Briscoe (6-2/2015/Newark, NJ, St. Benedict’s): There is a more productive off-the-dribble scorer in camp – the cat is ambidextrous!
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