Frank Burlison

LEXINGTON, Ky. – All of the big names of the Nike Elite Youth Basketball League were on display Saturday at the Kentucky Basketball Academy on the second day of the second weekend of the 2015 EYBL.

Among those players were 6-foot-9 Harry Giles (Winston-Salem, NC, Wesleyan Christian) of Team CP3, 6-7 Jayson Tatum (St. Louis Chaminade) of the St. Louis Eagles and 6-4 Malik Monk (Bentonville, AR) of the Arkansas Wings – each, certainly, to be found in a consensus selection of the five best prospects in the national class of 2016.

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LOUISVILLE – With as many as five games going on at the same time in the building over five hours Friday night, one could easily have found himself in scramble mode during the second weekend of the Under Armour Association Grassroots Basketball League in the Mid-American Sports Center.

And I was at my scrambling best while watching big chunks of six 17Under games and two more in the 16U division.

So here goes.

I’ll rehash what I saw in the approximate order in which I watched it:

*Coach Mike Mullins’ Illinois Wolves got an impressive jump shooting performance out of 6-foot-5 Nate Kennell (Metamora, IL, High) in their 50-40 win against New Heights (NY).

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LAGUNA NIGUEL – In a season in which there were multiple candidates within the senior class for the honor it’s a member of the Class of 2016 who bagged the BurlisonOnBasketball Most Outstanding Player nod.

Lonzo Ball of Chino Hills High, the best point guard prospect produced in Southern California since Baron Davis was a senior at Santa Monica Crossroads 18 years ago, is the BurlisonOnBasketball Southern California Most Outstanding Player for the 2014-15 season.

Ball, who committed to UCLA more in the winter of 2013, averaged 24.3 points, 11.3 rebounds, 9.1 assists, 4.5 steals and 3.5 blocked shots per game.

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LAGUNA NIGUEL – Rex Pflueger, a key element to Mater Dei High teams that won 64 games over two seasons, is the BurlisonOnBasketball Most Outstanding Player for the 2014-15 Southern California senior class.

The 6-foot-5 Pflueger, who signed a national letter of intent with Notre Dame in November, averaged 16.9 points, 6.2 rebounds, 3.4 assists and 3.0 steals per game for a 29-5 Monarchs squad this season.

The program’s bid for a fifth consecutive state championship was thwarted when Coach Gary McKnight’s squad fell to Oakland Bishop O’Dowd, 65-64, in overtime, in the Open Division finale on March 28 in UC Berkeley’s Haas Pavilion.

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LAGUNA NIGUEL, Ca. – Southern California’s boys’ high school hoops Class of 2016 is shaping up as something special.

And a significant reason is the presence of Lonzo Ball in the class.

Even with the presence of San Diego’s Player of the Year – T.J. Leaf, that area’s top prospect in a long while – and a couple of players who let their teams to state title games (Michael Cage Jr. of Santa Ana Mater Dei and De’Anthony Melton of Encino Crespi), Ball is the clear choice as the BurlisonOnBasketball 2014-15 Most Outstanding Player in the Southern California junior class.

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