LONG BEACH, Ca. – The Utah Prospects program left the city with championships in the 14-, 15- and 16-under divisions Monday afternoon.
But it was the Southern California-based Double Pump squad that captured the biggest prize during the final day of the Magic Memorial Festival in the Cabrillo High gymnasium.
Despite trailing by as many as eight points in the second half, Double Pump took the lead at 48-46 over the L.A. Rockfish with about 30 seconds to go and that shot by L.A. Dorsey High senior-to-be Tommie Groce proved to provide the final points of the Battlezone 17U bracket.
Two other prospects from the Class of 2016, point guard Colin Slater (Immanuel High in Fresno) and center Trevor Stanback (Pasadena Maranatha), also hit key shots and joined the 6-3 Groce in making other significant plays down the stretch for DP.
With his team five short of the 10-foul mark that would automatically send Rockfish to the free-throw line, DP Coach David Rebibo (Studio City Harvard-Westlake High) ordered his team to commit four consecutive fouls before a Rock Fish player could launch.
And, after inbounding the ball after the fourth foul with 3.2 seconds to go, wasn’t able to get off a potentially score-tying or game-winning shot attempt.
It was a wild Sunday night in quarterfinal action in the bracket, as three squads that figured to have ample opportunity to come away as champion, the host Compton Magic, the Utah Prospects and Dream Vision, were stunned by the Oakland Rebels, Prodigy (from the Inland Empire region of Southern California) and Rockfish, respectively.
Compton Magic was playing without its two most well-known performers, San Diego County residents in 2016 forward T.J. Leaf (El Cajon Foothills Christian) and 2017 guard Jaylen Hands (Chula Vista Mater Dei; he may transfer to Foothill Christian for his junior year).
But the cupboard was hardly bare with three standouts from Corona Centennial, 6-9 bookends Jalen Hill (2017) and Ike Anigbogu (2016), as well as senior-to-be and jump shooting-specialist Jordan Griffin.
And the Utah Prospects came into the event with four players from the Class of 2016 being strongly recruited by major college programs including 6-3 guard Frank Jackson (Highland Lone Peak).
Prodigy got strong play throughout the weekend from guards Brian Beard (a 2014 graduate of Rancho Cucamonga High who attended a prep school in the most recent school year) and Bryce Peters (a 6-3 jump shooter from La Verne Damien’s Class of 2016).
Dream Vision came into the event with a couple of the better jump shooters in the western Class of 2016 in Vance Jackson (Bellflower, CA, St. John Bosco) and Brendan Bailey (American Fork, UT), each of which goes about 6-7.
The two San Diego-based programs, Gamepoint and the San Diego All-Stars, each had multiple D1 prospects.
Gamepoint was led by Justin Davis (6-5/Morse), Eric Monroe (6-1/St. Augustine) and Tim Harrison (6-8/Parker) – all from the Class of 2016 – while the SDA got solid performances from Justin Moore (6-4/Mission Bay), who’ll be a senior in the fall, Richard Polanco (6-7/Army-Navy) and J.J. Overton (6-4/Rancho Bernardo).
The Oakland Rebels (beaten by Double Pump in the semifinals), despite losing 6-8 forward Dontay Bassett (from Oakland by way of Oldsmar Christian School in Florida) to an ankle injury the first night, had a strong performance by way of some solid shooting by Kevin Warren (Berkeley St. Mary’s) and Brandon Lawrence (Hayward Moreau Catholic) and all-around play of two other seniors-to-be, 6-4 Jeremi Hanks (Oakland by way of Balboa in San Diego) and 6-5 Sayeed Pridgett (El Cerrito).
In the 16U division, the Utah Prospects toppled MOC Elite (64-45), 90 minutes or so after edging the Compton Magic in a down-to-the-wire semifinal.
Like all of the Prospects’ squads at the event, the 16s were quite deep in quality players with 6-5 juniors-to-be Jaxon Brenchley (Hyrum Mountain Crest), Samuta Avea (South Jordan Bingham) and Trevin Knell (Woods Cross).
Brenchley will have an opportunity to play anywhere on the perimeter at whichever college program he ultimately is a part of; he’s that multiple-skilled.
Avea recently relocated from Hawaii and his recruiting stock should climb fairly rapidly in July when college coaches get an up-close look at him.
And Knell has one of the tightest – and most accurate – jump shots in the class, anywhere.
The Compton Magic squad got three days of sizzling play from one of the Southland’s best jump shooters in the 2017 class (6-3 Chris Williams of Orange Lutheran) and from one of the west’s best sophomores-to-be (6-5 Jules Bernard of L.A. Windward).
The Las Vegas Knicks 16U club had a couple of the very best players in Las Vegas – Bishop Gorman and Findlay Prep included – in a of juniors-to-be from Desert Pines in 6-4 Trevon Abdullah and 6-7 Greg Floyd.
Floyd (who started his prep career at Clark in Las Vegas) is a very good jump shooter but Abdullah had more of an impact at both ends of the floor for their squad over the weekend – including in a 51-48 win over the eventual division champion Utah Prospects in pool play.
The Utah Prospects’ 15U squad picked up its hardware via its 58-48 win over Gamepoint, despite a scintillating effort by 2018 point guard Taurus Samuels (Vista).
The Prospects used its skilled guards (including Hunter Erickson of Timpeview, Jared Bagley of Logan and Max Watson of Box Elder) to pulled away from the San Diego squad.
The Prospects’ 14U squad rolled pretty much rolled the competition in its division, beating Gamepoint in the finale, 59-41.
Guards Rylan Jones (the son of Utah State Assistant Coach Chris Jones will attend Sky View) and Brig Willard (Bountiful) were pretty much un-guardable over the weekend.
And, speaking of “un-guardable” – how are severe will the headaches be for the opposing coaches who have to find a way to keep 7-footer Matt Van Komen (Lehi) from crunching their high school teams over the next four seasons?
He’s skinny (and then some, at about 190 or so pounds) and just turned 14 years old but has the fluidity of movement, reliability of hands and softness of shooting touch to present a pretty good argument as to why he’s going to one of the most dominating centers in high school hoops before too deep into his prep career in Utah.
Other division champions were the Frogg All-Stars (12U), Compton Magic (13U) and Coastal Elite (17U “Elite”).
I know you have to report on all the players were suppose to impact the tournament however, I find it strange you refuse to mention PSSA pro skills sports academy (my club) that beat LV Knicks AND SOME Of THE TALENTED KIDS We have. I got into this game to help kids get some exposure to playing kids that are suppose to be the best of their class and we held our own throughout the weekend all the way to championship day on monday. Yet still no mention of PSSA. I’ve always heard of the tainted writing and how players are politically overlooked, even how slanted travel ball and the organizational leaders who run them. I though people would be excites about a club that had rise to the occasion against the best but instead not one mention not one photo not one word. Ugly… very Ugly….be fair be objective…you can still write about your influential talents but don’t leave out the real storyline. Other kids and parents would like to read about their accomplishments too