Some sweet quarterfinals on tap in Pangos tourney

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LONG BEACH, Ca. – The “Invitational” division of the Pangos Summer Sweet 16 Tournament got underway Friday night over the three quarts in the main gymnasium on the campus of Cabrillo High in the LBC.

Those eight games set the stage for what should be some, uh, “sweet” second-day showdown at the same location.

Take this as your “invitation” to Cabrillo High (2001 Santa Fe Ave, by way of a southward trek on the 710, and west-bound exit on Willow and south-bound turn on Santa Fe).

Winning those opening-round games in front of dozens of college coaches from across the country, as well as the usual plethora of “Internet analysts” (led by Long Beach’s own, Joel Francisco of ESPN.com), were: the Utah Prospects (over Gamepoint Black of San Diego); the L.A. Rockfish (over Marcus Banks Hard to Guard of Las Vegas); the Earl Watson Pangos Elite of Los Angeles and surrounding communities (over Inland, from the Inland Empire in San Bernardino, CA, County); the Arizona Stars Elite (over Branch West Elite of Southern California); Team Superstar from Fresno and surrounding cities (over the Arizona Magic Elite); the Las Vegas Prospects (over the Magic of Arizona); Prodigy Elite, another Inland Empire-based squad (over Supreme Court, from Germany); and Belmont Shore, with players from all over the Southland (over the Nevada Wolverines).

Consolation bracket games set to get underway Saturday at 1:10 p.m. are: Supreme Court vs. Nevada Wolverines (Ct. 1); Inland vs. Branch West (Ct. 2); Arizona Magic vs. The Magic (Ct., which is in the adjacent girls’ gym).

Another consolation game will be played at 2:20, with Gamepoint vs. Hard To Guard (also on Ct. 4).

The championship bracket contests also begin at 1:10, with what could be the highlight contest of the day: the Utah Prospects vs. the L.A. Rockfish (Ct. 3), and follow at 2:20 with Earl Watson Pangos Elite vs. Arizona Stars Elite (Ct. 1); Team Superstar vs. Las Vegas Prospects (Ct. 3); and Prodigy Elite vs. Belmont Shore (Ct. 2).

Each team will also play another game on Saturday, with times, court numbers and opponents to be determined based upon the day’s earlier results.

The most compelling and entertaining contest of Friday was the 65-63 decision that Team Superstar over a club from Arizona that was playing without its two best prospects (Class of 2014 posts Michael Humphrey and Andre Adams, who are due to return today from Philadelphia and a Reebok-fronted camp).

There was quite the display of jump shooting in the game, with 6-foot-4 Braxton Huggins (Bakersfield Miramonte) of Team Superstar and 6-6 Sherron Wilson (Las Vegas Clark) of Arizona Magic hitting something approaching 16 jumpers – from mid- to deep-range – between them.

Appropriately enough, I suppose, this is how the game was decided:

Coming out of a timeout, Wilson hit about a 23-footer to tie the score at 63 with about 20 seconds to go in regulation.

But there was not to be overtime for this one – Huggins saw to that.

He oh-so-calmly hit a pull-up 15-footer, at the buzzer, go move his team into Saturday afternoon’s game with the Las Vegas-based Prospects.

There wasn’t nearly the drama in the other seven opening-night tilts.

*Even with already-slender 6-8 forward Brekkott Chapman playing at far less than 100 percent after a bout with a respiratory illness that resulted in a loss of 12 pounds over the past two weeks (according to Prospects’ coach Lynn Lloyd), the Utah team was able to pull away down the stretch against a game San Diego club.

Future BYU power (and then some!) forward Dalton Nixon (from Orem) and 6-9 Makol Mawien (a rapidly improving junior-to-be from Granger who is going to be a big hit with the recruiters who showed up at this event) helped dominate the action in and around to get the Prospects to their Saturday showdown with the L.A. Rockfish.

Gamepoint hung tight most of the way being two seniors-to-be whose stock with recruiters should climb after this week: 6-4 Brian Finley (Encinitas Santa Fe Christian), a terrific jump shooter off the catch; and 6-3 Jackie Davis (San Pedro Rolling Hills Prep), a nice athlete with a lot of point-guard potential for the college level.

*Belmont Shore, led by the dynamic duo from Bellflower, CA, St. John Bosco of 6-7 Daniel Hamilton and 6-4 junior-to-be Tyler Dorsey, got all it could handle from the Nevada Wolverines (led by 2014 point guard Deshawn Pughsley of Reno Wooster), before pulling away.

*Earl Watson Pangos was always at least somewhat-comfortably ahead although never really overwhelming Inland. EW Pangos some of the better 2014 prospects in Southern California, including 6-9 Joe Furstinger (Santa Margarita), 6-0 Devin Watson (San Diego Army-Navy) and 6-4 D.J. Ursery (Encino Crespi).

*Rockfish, led by 6-11 Thomas Welsh (L.A. Loyola) and 6-1 Robert Cartwright (La Canada Flintridge Prep), rolled over Hard To Guard by a margin of 40-plus points (sorry; I didn’t write down all of the final scores!).

*The Las Vegas Prospects has several very good 2014 guards, including Shaquile Carr (Canyon Springs) and Darryl Gaynor (Durango) and has been boosted with the addition of jump shooting-specialist T.J. Haws (Lone Peak) from Utah.