LaGRANGE, IL – The city of Chicago, proper, was well-represented when it came time Sunday evening to sort out my choices for the best players I watched over the course of the two-day 2013 Pangos All-Midwest Frosh/Soph Camp at the Park District Recreation Center.
City programs Simeon (Zach Norvell, Josh Thomas and Ben Coupet), Morgan Park (Charlie Moore and Alonzo Chatman) and Whitney Young (Skylar Nash) accounted for six of the 17 sophomores among my choices for the Top 25 players I saw over the weekend.
One eighth-grader – 6-foot-6 Bol Bol (from Olathe, KS, St. Paul) – joined seven freshmen on the list.
Each of the approximately 180 or so players who attended the camp played twice on Saturday and twice again on Sunday morning, with action capped with Top 60 and then Top 30 “Cream of the Crop” all-star contests.
The prospect that most impressed me Saturday evening and Sunday morning – 6-foot-6 Brian Bowen, a freshman at Arthur Hill High in Saginaw, MI – was selected to the Top 30 game but wasn’t able to participate because of a Michigan State High School Association rule which prohibits athletes with remaining prep eligibility from participating in “all-star games”.
The squad wearing the black sides of the camp jerseys prevailed in the Top 60 game, with freshman forward Stephen Harris and Bol, along with sophomores Evan Hines, Drew Homa and Noah McCarty, playing particularly well throughout.
And they, for the most part, avoided the fit of “shot hunting” that, unfortunately, infected even the camp’s more judicious players on Saturday and early Sunday once the all-star competition rolled around.
The performances of the aforementioned players in that game secured their spots on my Top 25.
Grant Gelon (from Crown Point, IN) used the Top 30 game (with the white jerseys prevailing, 104-93) to re-enforce what I believed after Saturday’s action: He was the camp’s best long-range jump shooter.
He hit three of four attempts from well behind the arc in the first half – with the fourth dipping deep into the iron before bouncing out from about 23 feet away.
Ironically enough, he, too, was one of the very few players in the last game of the camp that didn’t yield to the temptation of launching as soon as leather met fingertips.
The camp’s best “true posts” all showed why I believe that to be the case as Chatman, Reid Nikko, Manny Patterson and Nick Rakocevic were all pretty effective, in and around the lane on both ends of the floor.
Who were the best “true point guards” in the camp?
Well, multiple players – especially Moore, Eugene German and freshmen Devontae Lane and Jamar Adams – looked the part in stretches of the Top 30 affair.
My choices for the Top 25 players in the camp
(Listed by position and alphabetically)
*Point guard-types – Jamar Adams (6-0/2017/East Chicago, IN, Central); Eugene German (5-10/2016/Gary, IN, 20th Century Charter); Evan Hines (6-2/2016/Skokie, IL, Niles West); Devontae Lane (6-0/2017/Iowa City West); Charlie Moore (5-9/2016/Chicago Morgan Park); and Devon Sams (5-11/2016/Bolingbook, IL).
*Shooting guards/wings – Bol Bol (6-6/2018/Olathe, KS, St. Paul); Brian Bowen (6-6/2017/Saginaw, MI, Hill); Grant Gelon (6-4/2016/Crown Point, IN); Stephen Harris (6-5/2017/Chicago North Lawndale Prep); Drew Homa (6-5/2016/Omaha Creighton Prep); Darien Jackson (6-1/2017/Overland Park, KS, Blue Valley Northwest); Connor McCaffery (6-4/2017/Iowa City West); Skylar Nash (6-5/2016/Chicago Whitney Young); Jamal Nixon (6-3/2017/Oak Park, IL, Fenwick); Zach Norvell (6-5/2016/Chicago Simeon); Josh Thomas (6-1/2016/Chicago Simeon); and Antonio Williams (6-1/2016/Maywood, IL, Proviso East).
*Posts – Alonzo Chatman (6-8/2016/Chicago Morgan Park); Ben Coupet (6-8/2016/Chicago Simeon); Tevin Ferris (6-6/2016/Gary, IN, Roosevelt); Noah McCarty (6-7/2016/Sterling, IL, Newman Catholic); Reed Nikko (6-8/2016/Maple Grove, MN); Nick Rakocevic (6-9/2016/Westchester, IL, St. Joseph); and Nick Robinson (6-6/2016/Gary, IN, Roosevelt).
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