wcbest seniors first session

Here's who was selected to the Senior All-Star Teams from this year's first session of the West Coast All-Star Camp to play in the senior all-star game. Two teams were formed from this group, and they duked it out for 20 minutes today before a host of college coaches, other players, parents and high school coaches:

Shea Anderson	6'-6"	Sr	Long Beach Poly	California
Gus Argneal	6'-0"	Sr	De La Salle California	California
Yusef Aziz	6'-4"	Sr	Foster	Washington
Aras Baskanskas	6'-3	Sr.	Santa Monica	California
Mike Bonwell	6'-6"	Sr.	Santa Fe Christian	California
Kemmy Burgess	6'-1"	Sr.	El Cajon Valley	California
Kyle Dodd	6'-0"	Sr.	Brea Olinda	California
Gabriel Hughes	6'-9"	Sr.	Bishop Montgomery	California
Matthew Logie	6'-4"	Sr.	Mercer Island	Washington
Ryan McDade	6'-6"	Sr.	Enumclaw	Washington
Melvin Owens	6-1"	Sr.	Inglewood	California
Josh Wallace	6'-10"	Sr.	Casa Grande	Arizona
Jaquay Carlyle	6'-6"	Sr.	J.W. North Riverside	California
Earl Lewis	6'-5"	Sr.	Junipero Serra	California
Gregg Smith	6'-10"	Sr.	Cottage Grove	Oregon
Chris Williams	6'-8"	Sr.	Notre Dame (Sherman Oaks)	California
Joe Gilliam	6'-2"	Sr.	Fresno Edison	California
Johnny Hardwick	6'-9"	Sr.	Los Angeles Manual Arts	California
Finn Rebassoo	6'-4"	Sr.	Garfield	Washington
George Wrighster	6'-5"	Sr.	Los Angeles Sylmar	California

We're sure that there were other seniors who were equally deserving of being nominated to this team, but clearly, everyone who was out on the floor in this game was worthy of the nomination, and there were some really big time guys who stood out more than others. Shea Anderson, for example, had a solid game, and showed why lots of colleges will be drooling over him. At 6'-6" he's got the height, mobility and handle lots of colleges are looking for in a shooting guard/small forward type, and he played great defense in this game and during the camp. We were really impressed by Gus Argneal, a smooth, compact guard who can and does pull the trigger with great accuracy; he's got good strength, nice balance and a great handle, and best of all, he can take a man off the dribble with a very quick first step.

Yusef Aziz is another player from the great Northwest we'd never seen before, and he's a terrific outside shooter who has decent height and plays defense very well. Our favorite guy though was Aras Baskauskas, probably because of the way some of the coaches were mispronouncing his name, one of them shouting encouragement throughout the game "hey Babushka, nice play" or "way to go Babushka." However his name is pronounced (we're still not sure), he's going to be one of the reasons that Santa Monica will do very well this year in CIF Southern Section and probably take the Bay League. Yeah, we know we only saw him in this one game, but he's a very good player, athletic, loves to go to the basket, with great speed and good knowledge of the game. Mike Bonwell and Kemmy Burgess played well as did Matthew Logie, a smooth fine shooting guard, but the real deal on the floor at point guard was Kyle Dodd of Brea-Olinda who will be the likely successor to Ron McMillian. We've liked Kyle ever since we first saw him for an extended period last year, and this year he's gotten even better. He was so quick that none of the other guys could stick with him on defense, and he has tremendous accelleration in the open court, a great crossover dribble, and the ability to go to the hole or pull up within close range. He pulled the trigger a bit too often from the outside and missed a bunch of shots, but we think he's a great college prospect. His counterpart for a good deal of the game was Melvin Owens, at least when he showed up (he missed the first 10 minutes of the game) from Inglewood another quick point guard with a great handle and fine moves, but who often gets a bit out of control. Actually if Melvin was a bit rattled he had a good excuse. Seems that the way the camp works is that at the end of the Great 8 games, every player is supposed to turn in his jersey and in exchange they get a t-shirt; everyone except the guys in the all-star games, who don't turn the jerseys in until after they are done playing. Well, Melvin's team coach didn't tell him that he was in the all-star game, Melvin turned in his jersey and thought he was done. Actually he was almost in tears when he realized that he was supposed to be playing in the game when he heard the pre-game introductions, so he spent the time scrambling to find a jersey. So this is a lesson to all you future Double Pump Camp players: Find out if you're on an all-star team before you return your jersey.

Jaquay Carlyle had some nice moves and a couple of great baskets, and generally distingushed himself as one of the best in this year's senior SoCal class, as did George Wrighster, who is clearly a "football-player" type, and actually there's a reason for that--expect to see him at one of the Pac-10 schools as a football scholarship player which will leave him the option of still walking on in basketball. Chris Williams showed why Notre Dame of Sherman Oaks might actually challenge Chaminade for the Mission League title this year (together with teammates like Cody Pearson (who made the Freshman-Sophomore All-Stars). Josh Wallace played great, is more of a finesse player than a power guy for someone 6'-10, and is really the opposite of Gregg Smith who's really a bit slow footed but otherwise more of a wider body. Earl Lewis, Joe Gilliam and Finn Rebasso all played well too and showed that they deserved to be named as some of the best seniors in camp.