SoCalHoops High School & Prep News

Double Pump West Coast All Stars
Freshmen-Sophomore All-Star Team--(July 14, 1998)

The second session of the West Coast All-Star Camp finished up today, and All-Star teams were selected. The first game played was the Freshmen-Sophomore All Star Game, consisting of the Top 14 in both classes. The process of selection, for those interested, was much more complex than would be typically expected, especially for an "exposure" camp. While other camps make selections on the basis of "politics", or favors which might be owed to players or coaches, or to enhance the reputation of a camp by naming only "big name" players, Double Pump is at least a bit unique in that they base the selections only upon in-camp performance criteria.

For those interested in the selection process, we found out that there is a "standing committee", headed by one of the coaches in camp; there are five other coaches, all of whom have performed this task for the for the past six years. David and Dana Pump are not on the committee, much to our surprise. Other coaches, staff and recruiting folks, including SoCalHoops, were asked to recommend players to members of the committee, but ultimately it was only the committee itself which made the selections. Once the committee started its deliberations and the process began, no one who was not a member of the committee got into or out of the room. The committee started the selection process at about 11:00 p.m. last night, and (we're told) didn't finish the selections until about 3:00 a.m. the next morning.

Here's who was selected as the Top 14 Freshmen-Sophomores at the West Coast All-Star Camp:

Freshman-Sophomore All-Stars (Top 14)

The freshmen-soph game was played this morning following the conclusion of the "Slick Six" tournament, and because of the absence of Apolinar Fernandez, who presumably was getting an early start to Las Vegas, Ned Pajic (6'-0" So. G) from Mira Costa High in Redondo Beach was selected to participate in the game.

The players were divided into "white" and "blue" teams. Two players dominated the game, and both were on the "blue" squad. While the selection process was meticulously and scrupulously fair, the process of dividing these guys up into teams was pretty much of the eeny-meeny-meiny-moe type, with Camp Director and head honcho Phil Bryant getting the honors. Phil made the big mistake of putting Torin Beeler and Skyler Wilson on the same team, and it was a potent combination. Torin was selected as the Most Valuable Player, and he clearly deserved it. He was the strongest player on the floor, and he slashed, drove, and ripped rebounds away from Jason Parker who was the big man on the white squad. The point play was very capably handled by Wilson for the blues and Chris Hernandez and Eric Giles for the white squads.

David Gale and Baker Dunleavy played 2 guard for the white and blue teams, respectively. Dunleavy is a sort of minature version of his older brother Mike, who lit it up in the "Best of the Best" game and was the MVP there. Dunleavy (the younger) plays well in the open floor, is just developing his shot (he still shoots a bit low and is just moving his shot up), but had some very nice passes in the lane, and in general will be a big time player. Gale played with a heavily taped left foot (with what turned out to be a stress-fracture) and limped noticeably, but still managed to bury two big three pointers.

There were actually quite of few players who we wanted to see on this team, but who were not selected for reasons we can't quite fathom. Several of the younger players who got some tremendous exposure playing for some of the "stacked" teams and who were thus a bit overshadowed by the "big name" players at the camp were not selected, we suspect because of the very nature of the high-profile teams they were placed on during the camp. Among the players we would have liked to see on the team were Charlie Kranzdorf (6'-0" Fr. G/F) from Montclair Prep who played on the "Utah" team, on which he was a bit overshadowed by teammates such as Mike Dunleavy (6'-6" Sr. F), Richard Fox (6'-10" Sr. F/C) from Regis Jesuit, Jason Morrissette (6'-4" Jr. G/F) and Joe Shipp (6'-6" Sr. G/F) both from LA Fairfax, Branduinn Fullove (6'-6" Jr. G/F) from Simi Valley, Earl Lewis (6'-5" Sr. G) and Joe Walton (5'-11" Sr. PG) from Fresno Edison. Likewise, Kranzdorf's only sophomore teammate on Utah, Brandon Brown (6'-0" So. G) from Gridley, was another mysterious non-selection to the all-star team. But keep in mind that the "stacked" teams also played other "stacked" teams. So guys like Kranzdorf and Brown were not lacking for attention from the college scouts (geez, remember these are only underclassmen) who came out to watch the "big guns". And Kranzdorf and Brown also had the unenviable distinction (or enviable, depending upon how you look at playing against top competition) of getting dunked on by Carlos Boozer, Jason Kapono, Gilbert Arenas and DeShawn Stevenson over a three day span, but they both proved they can defend even the best, and they played well for all four days. Other players we would have liked to see on this team were Dommanic Ingerson (6'-1" So. G) from Oakland McClymonds, who proved he was a big time player with good size, speed and quickness. Michael Jenkins (5'-8" So. G) from St. Francis also was a nice player, with good fundamentals and speed who we would have liked to see on this team. David De Leon (5'-10" Fr. G) was another player who we think just missed the cut.

Congratulations to those who made the 1998 West Coast All-Star Freshman-Sophomore team.

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