artesia transfers

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SoCalHoops High School News

More Transfer News: Team U.N.
(Artesia) Lands A Couple More--(May 12, 1999)

It's absolutely a fact that Wayne Merino's reputation as an excellent high school coach precedes him, and it's certainly responsible, at least in part, for the number of great players Artesia has had over the years, and it's certainly also responsible for the number of great athletes who continue to flock to the school. And even though Artesia will be without the graduating Jason Kapono, they're getting some new transfers who will hopefully make it a little less painful.

We got the word this past weekend in an e-mail from Donnie Wilkie about a new transfer for Artesia. Donnie, for those who may know of him runs the City of Palms Classic Tournament in Florida, a great high school tournament, which coincidentally will feature Mater Dei this coming holiday season, from December 18-23 in Fort Myers, Florida. According to Donnie, Lakewood Artesia HS, which already has enough foreign-nationals to be called "Team U.N." only half-jokingly (e.g., Jack Martinez and Amaury Fernandez from the Dominican Republic, Jon Steffanson from Iceland, etc.) will pick up a new French player, Samual Nadeau (6'-5" So. F) who played this past season at East Side H.S. in Newark, New Jersey. And independent of Donnie's e-mail we also learned that Artesia is picking up another young guy, Ryan Mueller (6'-7" So. PF) although where he came from is unclear.

We didn't get out to the Slam N Jam Spring League playoff games played this past weekend (we were busy watching lots of other guys at the Rockfish workouts), so we read the reports of the games posted at WestCoastHoops and PacWestHoops by Rich Meyer and Mike Miller, respectively, paying particular attention to the QBL game descriptions. Both reports confirm that Nadeau was in attendance, as was Mueller. According to Rich Meyer at WCH, Nadeau is " about 6'6", thin, smooth, and an instant starter next year for Artesia, taking Jason Kapono's spot in the lineup." According to Mike Miller, Nadeau "is a sleek wing player who will likely start for Artesia next year. . ."

Nadeau's transfer to Artesia is contrary to several reports which circulated last week which had him transferring to Oak Hill Academy in Mouth of Wilson, Virginia. We haven't seen Nadeau play but we're told that he's one of the best underclassmen anywhere, and will be a definite asset for Artesia next season.

As for Mueller, Mike described him as a "slender, active kid who's just bulking up." Other than what others have told us and what we've read, we really know nothing about these two guys, but we'll be checking them out at the EBO adidas Hoop Summit in Fresno over Memorial Day where QBL will be playing. We'll have more on these two transfers and the EBO tournament in general in a day or two. We're also planning to check them out at the Artesia Best in the West (summer version) which is scheduled for June 28 through July 3 at Artesia HS.

Stay tuned because it looks like Artesia is still going to be the team to beat for a long time in Division I of CIF and at some of the better tournaments this summer.