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The Shabazz Muhammad-led “Las Vegas Orangemen” overpowered the Grant Jerrett-fronted “La Verne Trojans” Saturday night, 80-68, in a battle of two of the top high school squads in the west during the Fullcourt Press Fall Hoops Classic at the HAX in Harbor City in Southern California.

The “Orangemen”, of course, is the team of players from Bishop Gorman while the “Trojans” are the squad that will represent one of Southern California’s best in 2011-12, La Verne Lutheran.

In other quarterfinals Saturday evening, the “Jackrabbits” (Long Beach Poly High) edged Branch West Elite, 63-61, on Jordan Bell’s 5-footer along the right baseline in “sudden death” after a couple of two-minute overtime; the Cali Rebels got a buzzer-beating bucket by Huntington Beach (CA) Ocean View freshman guard Kendall Small to stun Belmont Shore, 69-67; and California Supreme outlasted Cal Select, 82-73.

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Are you immune to the college (football) spirit?

Is the thought of being forced to watch an NFL game and listen to all the drivel flowing from the mouths of those equating it with something entertaining or important provide you with a nice definition of “painfully dull”?

Then I definitely have an entertainment option for you over a stretch of 25 hours or so this weekend in Southern California.

Three squads of players making up three of the better high school teams in the west, along with assorted other nifty prospects playing on 13 other travel squads will make up the field of the Fullcourt Press Fall Hoops Classic at the HAX in Harbor City (1515 240^th Street) this Saturday and Sunday.

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I’ve been a member of the John R. Wooden Award advisory committee for quite a while and one of the annual duties in the role is contributing 50 nominees for the list of the award’s preseason candidates that will be released to the public in a few weeks.

Transfers (including those athletes who red-shirted at their current school a year ago) and freshmen aren’t eligible for this initial list but, you can assume that those two categories will impact the mid-season list.

Not surprisingly, a large number — 36 — of my selections come from the six “BCS” conferences, with the Big Ten’s 10 leading the way followed by the SEC and Big East with seven each.

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The fall Southern California high school hoops season traditionally is tipped off with Dinos Trigonis’ Full Court Press Fall Showcase and that was the case once again for about eight hours on Sunday, this time at Dominguez High in Compton.

Many of the Southland’s top prospects — from middle-school eighth-graders to high-school seniors –participated in the eight games that were played.

Only one senior already committed to a college played in the final game. And 6-foot-9 Grant Jerrett (La Verne Lutheran/University of Arizona) played just about six minutes in the first half before spending the rest of the evening as a spectator.

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If you’ve found yourself on this website and are reading this, there is a strong likelihood we’ve got something in common.

You must share my passion for basketball. So, bookmark this site.

What will you find in these entries?

This anecdote should give you a clue:

During 1987, I covered the Lakers-Celtics Championship series (Magic Johnson vs. Larry Bird!) and the NCAA championship final (Keith Smart’s jump shot gives Bob Knight and Indiana the win over Jim Boeheim’s Syracuse team in New Orleans).

Oh, yes .

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