Burlison on Basketball

Frank Burlison | High School Basketball | College Basketball

Penda turns in “superbe Pangos” performance

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ATHENS — Noah Penda of Paris concluded a dominant two days of basketball Thursday afternoon, leading the “Blue” team to an eased-up, 81-68,  victory over its “Gold” counterpart in the Top 30 Cream of the Crop game that wrapped up the first-ever Pangos All-Euro Camp at the Basketaki Arena.

The 6-foot-7, 18-year-old was the overwhelming choice as the event’s Most Outstanding Player after grabbing eight rebounds to go with five points and six assists in the all-star clash.

Penda (pictured), a starter for the French squad that knocked off the U.S. in a semifinal before losing to Spain in the FIBA 19U World Cup Gold Medal game in Debrecen (Hungary) five weeks ago, also led his camp “Lakers” to three wins in a row Wednesday evening and Thursday morning.

Selected as the Most Outstanding Player for the blue jerseys in the all-star game was Eldin Ejubovic, a 6-1, 17-year-old jump-shooting and defensive dynamo from Amsterdam. He scored a game-high 15 points that included three 3s.

Picking up the same honor for the gold jerseys was 6-9, Stavros Karpouzis of Thessaloniki in Greece.

Karpouzis, who doesn’t turn 17 until Oct. 21, scored seven points (including a 3) with seven rebounds.

Six-four, Giorgos Giantsidis (an Athens resident that turned 14 on May 22) — maybe the best pure shooter among the 53 players in the camp — scored all his team’s points as the gold burst to a 10-4 advantage.

But the blue started answering with its own jump shots from a multitude of sources, including Ejubovic, and Penda exerted his dominance in every aspect of the game.

He closed the 20-minute first half in spectacular fashion, dribbling thru traffic at full-speed and flushing the ball through the iron — while being fouled – as the horn sounded.

That 3-point play put his team up, 45-31, and the gold was never closer than to within seven points the rest of the way.

My “Top 15 plus Most Outstanding Player” selections for the 10 camp games (including all-star game) I watched:

 

Most Outstanding Player

Noah Penda/6-7

18-years-old    Paris

 

Top 15

Kamil Cardot/6-5

18-YO  Reims, France

Rene Deinlein/6-3

16-YO  Mantel, Germany

Eldin Ejubovic/6-1

17-YO  Amsterdam, Netherlands

*Rodney Ekwoanya/6-5

18-YO  London, Great Britain

Giorgos Giantsidis/6-4

14-YO  Athens, Greece

Stavros Karpouzis/6-9

16-YO  Thessaloniki, Greece

Orestis Koutras/6-0

15-YO  Psychiko, Greece

Noel Emile-Lewis Mantock/6-4

16-YO Novi Sad, Serbia

Alleia Ivan Mobio/6-2

18-YO  San Bernardo, Italy

**Apostolos Paziotopoulos/6-3

18-YO  Athens, Greece

Bial Raymond-Pedersen/6-2

17-YO  Copenhagen, Denmark

Tomas Stankevicius/6-5

18-YO  Kaunas, Lithuania

***Atanasij Trajanov/6-6

17-YO  Vondo, Macedonia

Georgios Vassilakis/6-8

18-YO  Helsinki, Finland

Yannos Xanthpopoulos/6-8

16-YO  Athens, Greece

Note:

*Attends Evergreen Christian (Leesburg, VA)

**Attends Fairmont Academy (Orlando, FL)

***Attends Cooper Academy (Chino, CA)

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