Quarters set for UAA Invitational in Texas

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THE WOODLANDS, TX – The bracket in the 17-under division of the Under Armour Association Invitational was whittled to eight Saturday night in the Legends Sports Complex.

And it will take only something approaching six-plus hours Sunday to determine the event’s champion.

The four quarterfinal contests are each scheduled to tip off at about 8:30 Sunday morning in the building (which has four courts), with the semifinals to follow at 10:50 and the championship set for about 1:15 in the afternoon.

Each of the seven games should be nothing if not entertaining.

Hopefully “well-played” can be used to describe each later, as well.

Schedule to hook up on Court 1 are New Heights (based in New York) and Team Charlotte, with the Illinois Wolves and 1 Nation (Michigan) on Court 2, Earl Watson Elite (Los Angeles) and D.C. Premier on Court 3 and Atlanta Xpress We Are I (from the Philadelphia area) on Court 4.

*New Heights had a bye into the second round and then was barely “challenged” at all by either by Texas Pro (62-39) or Mo Williams Elite (86-44) during its two games on Saturday.

It has the two best player from the Class of 2014 (forward Michael Nzei/Our Savior in New York and guard Dupree McBrayer/New York City Spring Garden) in the event, and one of the best in the 2016 (Mustapha Heron/Sacred Heart in West Haven, CT) class, as well.

*Team Charlotte, one of the 16 teams with byes into the second round on Saturday, had a surprising margin of victory over Louisiana Elite (74-52) but had to rally from a double-digit deficit to edge the Las Vegas Prospects (77-72) Saturday night.

A strong performance at the free-throw line (24 of 32) proved to be a significant element in the game as the team from Las Vegas was just 11 of 17.

*Strong guard play – not surprisingly – helped the team from Illinois knock off big and gifted Team Breakdown of Florida, 62-55, and a squad from Baltimore (aka, “BMore’s Finest”), 62-49.

One of those guards, Roosevelt Smart (Palatine, IL), scored 14 and 19 points respectively, Saturday.

*Another 2016 standout, 6-6 Josh Jackson (Detroit Consortium), helped 1 Nation get to the quarterfinals while 2015 guard Josh McFolley (Mt. Clemens) averaged 13.5 points in the team’s wins over Team Thad (Memphis) and the Jersey Shore Warriors Saturday.

*The Earl Watson team used a balanced effort, led by forward Tres Tinkle (Missoula, MT, Hellgate), guard Tommy McCarthy (San Diego La Costa Canyon) and center Chance Comanche (Los Angeles View Park), to topple Crossover Elite (Houston), The City (New York) and Dallas Showtime Elyte (which stunned Kansas City Run in the second round) Saturday.

The left-handed Tinkle, whose play has no doubt been a revelation to those who hadn’t seen him in action – or heard of him – before this weekend, on Saturday averaged 15.3 points per game.

*D.C. Premier (the reincarnation of sorts of the program known as D.C. Assault) knocked off another California-based program Saturday night, while holding a Team Superstar squad, 69-59, that mostly draws its players from the central and northern regions of the state.

Guard Terrell Allen (Hyattsville, MD, DeMatha), with 16 points, was one of three players scoring in double figures against Team Superstar.

*Atlanta Xpress had just a collective nine-point, plus-margin while getting out of games with Philly Pride and Grassroots Indiana.

A nice 2015 forward, Dan Purifoy (Centreville, AL, Bibb County; he’s expected to attend school elsewhere for his senior season), scored 29 points against the Indiana team after tallying 14 against the Philadelphia squad.

*We R1 beat two Houston-based teams Saturday in the Rockstars (66-54) and the Defenders (51-48).

Forward Derrick Jones (Archbishop Carroll), one of the more spectacularly vertically explosive players in the Class of 2015, averaged 17.0 points on Saturday.