Preston and Rowan help Team Wall go 3-0 at adidas

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GARDEN GROVE, Ca. – Team Wall zipped to 3-0 Saturday night as the second day of the adidas Nations wrapped in the Next Level Sports Center.

Nine teams – four representing the United States and five others representing other regions across the world – are participating in one the last of the high-profile and super-competitive “national” events this summer that are made up of high school players.

Team Wall – named for John Wall of the Washington Wizards, one of the major players endorsing adidas products – continued to get strong efforts from Billy Preston, Maverick Rowan, Kobi Simmons and Rawle Alkins.

*Preston, who will be a sophomore at Redondo High in Redondo Beach (CA) in a few weeks, averaged 17.0 points and 9.5 rebounds during the wins Saturday over Team Latin America (102-69) and Team Europe (81-65).

*Rowan, a junior at Midland Park (PA) Lincoln this season, struggled with his shot vs. Team Europe (2 of 12 from the field) but was sizzling Saturday night with 21 points (and seven rebounds) by way of a 10 of 21 shooting effort from the field. He’s already committed to the University of Pittsburgh.

*Alkins, a junior-to-be at Christ the King in New York City, was 14 of 23 from the field Saturday while averaging 19.5 points and 6.5 rebounds. He’s averaging 18.0 ppg for the event.

*Simmons, who will be a junior at St. Francis in Alpharetta (GA), averaged 16.5 ppg Saturday.

Team (Damien) Lillard – also, like Team Wall, made up strictly of U.S. players with at least two years of high school eligibility remaining – knocked off Team Canada Saturday morning, 98-84, then had a bye Saturday night (four of the teams have byes).

Junior-to-be Eron Gordon (Indianapolis, high school to be determined), the brother of Eric Gordon of the New Orleans Pelicans, six players in double figures for Team Lillard by scoring 17 points,

Another guard from the Class of 2016, Dennis Smith (Fayetteville, NC, Trinity Christian), scored 12 points with a weekend-best for the event of 10 assists.

Two U.S. teams, Team (Derrick) Rose and Team (Dwight) Howard were beaten Saturday morning by Team Europe (79-74) and Team Africa (74-68), respectively.

Mouhamed Thiam (from Senegal) led Europe with 13 points and 10 rebounds. Team Europe is represented by the Canarias Basketball Academy (located in the Canary Islands).

Team Africa was paced by Renathan Ona Embo’s 18 points and five rebounds. He attended Findlay Prep (Henderson, NV) last school year but is now enrolled at Balboa City School (in San Diego).

The final four pool-play games begin Sunday morning at 10:15, with the U.S. teams matching up – Team Rose vs. Team Wall (Court 1) and Team Howard vs. Team Lillard (Court 4).

The other final pool-play matchups are Team Europe vs. Team Latin America (Court 2) and Team Asia Pacific vs. Canada (Court 3).

At 7:30 Sunday evening, the Pool A winner faces the Pool B runner-up (Court 1) and the Pool B winner takes on the Pool A runner-up (Court 4).

The losers of the respective games play at 4 p.m. (PT) Monday at Long Beach City College in the third-place game while the winners play for the championship game at 6 o’clock. Both contests will be televised by ESPNU.

I also caught decent portions of the scrimmages between the college counselors that were played Saturday morning and evening.

Among those that impressed me (and, I’m assuming, also impressed the dozens of representatives of NBA clubs on hand) were: E.C. Matthews (a 6-4 sophomore-to-be at Rhode Island who has been very good on both days); Shavon Shields and Terran Petteway (both will be seniors at Nebraska and could help the Huskers get into the NCAA tourney again); Norman Powell (the UCLA senior-to-be saw his jump shot falling Saturday); Josh Gray (a JC point guard who should help LSU get into the NCAA tourney) and Austin Nichols (he will have a huge sophomore season for Memphis).