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LONG BEACH – The BallerTV/Pangos Premier 80 tipped off a busy, five-day NCAA “live evaluation period” for high school boys’ grassroots basketball in Southern California Wednesday afternoon at McBride High.

The head coaches from the UCLA, Washington State, Fresno State, UC Irvine, UC Riverside and Texas Christian programs were among those that were courtside for the eight-game (players, from across the country, were spread among eight teams that played twice apiece over four hours) event.

And a large contingent of assistant coaches from the likes of USC, Arizona, Arizona State, Cal, New Mexico, Pepperdine, Loyola Marymount, Oklahoma, Cal Baptist, Grand Canyon, UC Santa Barbara, the University of Utah and Stanford also followed the action as players, in five-minute intervals, shuffled on and off the McBride gymnasium floor that was divided into two courts with two games running simultaneously.

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ORLANDO – Six-foot-nine Gregory “GG” Jackson, who is committed to signing a National Letter of Intent with the University of North Carolina in November, used his immense athletic power and hoops skill to help “Team Suns” past “Team Hawks”, 56-49, in the championship game of the 25h All-NBPA Top 100 Camp playoffs Friday afternoon at the Disney ESPN Wide World of Sports Center.

Jackson, while often pitted, 1-on-1, against Baye Fall (another of the elite “bigs” in the national Class of 2023), scored 13 points – despite missing 12 of 17 shots from the floor – to go with seven rebounds to cap a 7-0 run during the week.

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GLENDALE, AZ. – Three of the 14 divisional championship games went about as expected – down to the wire – Sunday on the final day of the Fiesta Bowl Section Seven Basketball Team Camp, held on the floor of the Phoenix Cardinals’ stadium.

In the showcase game of the entire three-day, 200-plus-teams event, California’s top two teams for 2022-23 clashed in the Field Bowl bracket finale, with Corona Centennial pulling away down the stretch to knock off Studio City Harvard-Westlake, 59-49.

Jared McCain and two other returning starters from the Huskies’ 33-1, CIF State Open-Division team, posts Aaron McBride and Devin Williams, proved the cumulative difference as Coach Josh Giles’ club scored the final eight points in the final two and a half minutes.

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GLENDALE, AZ – The west’s best boys high school basketball program of the past two seasons – and the team that will likely have the best chance of challenging it in 2022-23 – will hook up Sunday morning on one of 12 courts laid out on the floor of the State Farm Stadium in the third Fiesta Bowl Section Seven.

Championship games are scheduled in 14 divisions made up of 16 teams apiece from the west and a few beyond.

The title match of the most notable of those, the Fiesta Bowl, is set to tip at 11:30 (on “Court 4”) and will pit California State Open Division champion Corona Centennial (33-1 last season) and the squad it beat in the Feb 25, CIF Southern Section Open final, Harvard-Westlake (25-4).

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DRAPER, Utah – When it comes to providing a showcase for high school teams and players in and around Utah, no one does it better than Tim Davis.

That was once again the case when Davis – who, with Lynn Lloyd, helps run the adidas-fronted and well-respected Utah Prospects club program – put on the third annual Great Western Summer Classic, Wednesday-thru-Saturday, with Juan Diego High the “headquarters”.

But six other facilities were also in use for the hundreds of games involving 357 teams – 82 of those “varsity” – that came from all corners of Utah, as well as Idaho, Nevada, California (Balboa Prep in San Diego County) and New Mexico.

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