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LONG BEACH, Ca. – A memorial service will be held Sunday afternoon (June 15) at Long Beach City College for Bill Fraser, one of most respected and revered basketball coaches in Southern California.

Fraser, who passed away on April 16 at age 85, began his coaching career as the junior varsity coach at Long Beach Wilson High in 1958 and enjoyed immense success as the school’s varsity coach and then head man at Long Beach City College (from 1973 until his retirement in 1990).

During his stint at LBCC the Vikings won a state championship (in 1976) and advanced to the state championship Final Four five other times.

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SANTA ANA, Ca. – The Mater Dei High basketball program will play host to an 81-game tournament this weekend – with games spread over three courts in the school’s Meruelo Center.

Among the program joining the Monarchs in the event (which gets underway with three games tipping off at 3:30 Friday afternoon and then wraps up with three more games at 8:45 Sunday night) Bellflower St. John Bosco, Corona Centennial, Redondo Beach Redondo, Santa Margarita, L.A. Fairfax, Chatsworth Sierra Canyon and Anaheim Canyon.

Six programs that participated in the first-ever CIF Southern Section Open Division playoffs – Mater Dei, St.

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LONG BEACH, Ca. – The 12^th edition of the Pangos All-American Camp is a wrap.

From my respective, at least, it didn’t take the full four sessions of camp games – and the two all-star games – to determine who the two best players were from among the 120 or so who participated during the weekend event at Cabrillo High.

By Saturday afternoon it was clear that the best backcourt player at the camp was Isaiah Briscoe (Roselle, NJ, Catholic) and the best post player was Stephen Zimmerman (Las Vegas Bishop Gorman).

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LONG BEACH, Ca. – Stephen Zimmerman, via his on-court play over the first two days of the weekend, has spoken clear and succinctly as to why he has been considered one of the very best of the Class of 2015 for seemingly so very long.

The left-handed senior-to-be at Bishop Gorman High in Las Vegas put the entire litany of his immense set of skills on display during the 12^th Pangos All-American Camp at Cabrillo High

His performances invoked the names of two similarly sized (6-foot-10 and change) NBA players by three interested observers Saturday.

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LONG BEACH, Ca. – Day I of the Pangos All-American, Version XII, was like the other 11 first days:

It’s a time for scrambling to peruse the numerical roster and makeup of each camp “team”, determining which players on the rosters were actually in the building and in uniform and then deciding where to plop one’s butt in order to have the best viewing vantage point for a few hours’ worth of games.

For yours truly Friday night in the Cabrillo High gymnasium it was “check, check and check and then was I seated against the south wall, facing Court 3 for the 8:30 “ACC Division” clash between “Miami” and “North Carolina State”, and the 9:30 “Pac-12” contest between “USC” and “Washington”.

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