kings or better

SoCalHoops Tournament News

Kings Or Better To Open. . .5th Annual MLK, Jr. Challenge
& 1st Annual MLK Hoops Festival--(Oct. 3, 1998)

Seems there's a scheduling war brewing. Dinos Trigonis called us to inform us about the tentative lineup for the 5th Annual 1999 MLK Jr. Challenge which will be held at Pauley Pavilion and hosted by Dominguez High on Monday, January 18, from 9:00 a.m. until it's over. This time, instead of 9 games (which had the event ending near midnight after starting at a little before 9:00 a.m., a virtual marathon of hoops) there will only be 7 games, so we would anticipate that the thing will be done at about 10:00 p.m.

Here are the tentative lineups that Dinos gave us:

Dominguez v. Mater Dei (non-league)
Crenshaw v. Compton (non-league)
Fairfax v. Simi (non-league)
Long Beach Jordan v. Verbum Dei (non-league)
Manual Arts v. Long Beach Poly (non-league)
Inglewood v. Redondo (non-league)
Glendora v. TBA-- The TBA could possibly be Santa Clara, Grant High, or several others.

We're not quite sure how this is all going to work out, since many of these same teams are also slated to play in the 1st Annual MLK Hoops Festival hosted by Double Pump and Canyon High on Saturday, January 16, 1999 at Dominguez Hills. And there's at least one game that both event organizers seem to be "arguing" over, Inglewood v. Redondo. Geez, is it really that good a contest? Er, um, yeah, it will be.

It's still early, and we're not making any predictions about either of these schedules, but just for comparison's sake, here's the schedule we received from Double Pump for the event at Dominguez:

Los Alamitos vs Verbum Dei (non-league)
Canyon vs. Ocean View (non-league)
Inglewood vs. Redondo Beach (non-league)
Fontana vs. Fairfax (non-league)
Sylmar vs. Simi Valley (non-league)
Chaminade vs. Fresno Washington Union (non-league)
Long Beach Poly vs. Long Beach Jordan (league game)
Artesia vs. Mayfair (league game)
Bishop Montgomery vs. Serra (league game)

So what emerges is this picture: At Pauley you can expect to see Mater Dei and Dominguez, Crenshaw and Compton, Manual Arts, Glendora and whoever Glendora will be be matched up against.

Los Alamitos, Canyon, Ocean View, Fontana, Chaminade, Fresno Washington Union, Sylmar, Artesia, Mayfiar, Bishop Montgomery and Serra will be at Dominguez.

That much we know for certain

The open questions at this point is where you'll find Inglewood and Redondo, because it's pretty certain that they won't play two games in two days against each other (although it would be a fun matchup), and for some of the teams (like Verbum Dei, Fairfax, Simi, Long Beach Jordan and Long Beach Poly) if they will really participate in both events, it will mean that they will play league game on Wednesday or Thursday, then appear at the Pump MLK Hoops Festival on Saturday, then play at Pauley on Monday, followed by another league game on Tuesday or Wednesday.

And you thought the summer schedule was tough. Ahahahahahahaha! You haven't seen anything yet.

We've got a suggestion: Are these really the only teams that people want to see? Why fight over them? How about bringing a couple of teams up from San Diego (like last year when USDHS appeared at Pauley). What about J.W. North? Capistrano Valley? One of the Pasadena schools? Anybody got any suggestions on who else you'd like to see at these events? Let us know, or better yet, let Dinos Trigonis and Double Pump know by posting it up to the message board here at SoCalHoops.