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Frank Burlison | High School Basketball | College Basketball

All the boys’ hoop news you need from last weekend

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LONG BEACH – Some of the better Southern California-based boys high school and prep school players in the Classes of 2025 and ’26 were on display Sunday afternoon at McBride High during the Pangos Best of SoCal Showcase.

Four games were played, split between players in the senior and junior classes.

Several of the programs whose teams are expected to contend for CIF Southern Section Open Division playoff spots were represented Sunday.

St. John Bosco (6-foot-2 Gavin Dean-Moss), Redondo Union (6-4 Devin Wright) and Los Alamitos (6-5 Tyler Lopez) placed players in the second Juniors contest.

Lopez (pictured), the most underrated junior in Orange County (the days where that remains the case are dwindling rapidly), scored a team-high 23 points for the blue jerseys in their 92-89 loss to the white jerseys.

Guards from San Diego County, Charles Aldrich III of Rancho Buena Vista (24 points, including six 3s, for the white jerseys), Jaden Bailes of St. Augustine (17 points for the blue jerseys) and Caleb Newton of Mission Bay (11 points for the winners), jump shot superbly while coming for 10 3s.

The most high-profile player in that game – and in the entire event ­– was 6-8 Tajh Ariza, who will play his junior season for 2025 L.A. City Open Division favorite Westchester after spending the past two years at St. Bernard.

In the final contest of the evening, SoCal Academy’s 6-5 duo of Jacob Ross and Kevin Odih scored 24 and 23 points, respectively, to lead the white jerseys to a 101-93 decision in the second seniors contest.

Ross is a transfer from New York’s Long Island Lutheran while Odih made the trek west from South Kent Prep in Connecticut.

Two other transfers in the game for SoCal Academy were 6-9 Trent MacLean (Thousand Oaks) and 6-8 Trevon Carter-Givens (Templeton).

Two other standouts in that game were 6-5 Hudson Mayes (Redondo; he was one day removed from a recruiting trip to Cal Poly/San Luis Obispo), who scored 16 points for the white jerseys, as well as 6-6 B.J.  Davis-Ray (JSerra), who led the blue jerseys with 18 points.

Davis-Ray moved to San Juan Capistrano early in the summer from Duncanville, TX, and is one of several reasons why his new program is a challenger for a Trinity League title and a spot in the CIF SS Open playoff field in February.

Three seniors from Mira Costa, 6-8 Luke Hammerschmidt, 6-4 Jacob DeArmas and 6-7 Eneasi Piuleini, acquitted themselves admirably Sunday.

In another nifty weekend event in Long Beach, Coach Alan Mitchell’s St. Anthony program played host to six game involving players from 12 SoCal programs Saturday.

I caught the last four of them, the first with the Palos Verdes players edging their short-handed (due to illness and injury) Leuzinger counterparts, 62-58.

Six-five Max Sinfield (very bouncy!) was terrific for Palos Verdes and should be on short list of the better players in the South Bay, while 5-9 Darrell (just call him “Boogie” from here on in) Bagsby of Leuzinger – a transfer from Lynwood – should be one of the more dynamic sophomore guards in SoCal.

Making up the squad that could be Top 3 or so in the L.A. City Section, the Washington Prep players eased past Downey’s players, 82-48.

You won’t get any arguments if you suggest that juniors Tajh Ariza and Alijah Arenas (Chatsworth) are the two-best players in the L.A. City Section.

If you want to ID the top “senior” in the section, I’ll offer 6-2 Donald Thompson III of Washington Prep who started for City Open champion King/Drew as a junior.

Over the final two games, the Westchester crew pulled away to knock off Loyola, 67-54, while Jason Crowe Jr.-led Inglewood edged the host Saints players, 70-66.

Crowe’s father left Lynwood High in the summer to take over his prep alma mater’s program.

And, along with his son (one of the top junior guards anywhere), Crowe will field a squad with several returnees (notably guard Danaus Cockrell) as well as transfers in 6-9 Parker Jefferson (Waxahachie, TX), 6-5 Dwayne Boston (Gardena) and gifted 6-4 sophomore  David Conerly (Westchester).

Coach Mitchell’s program returns multiple key players from last season’s CIF SS 2AA champion, notably senior forwards Aman Haynes and Donovan Pitts), and has added a nifty junior guard in Jayshawn Kibble (King/Drew).

The center of the SoCal High School Hoops Universe Saturday and Sunday will be back at McBride High, where Dinos Trigonis will host his annual Pangos West Frosh/Soph Camp.

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