SoCal High School & Prep Report

21st Reebok Las Vegas Prep Holiday
Classic: Games 24-Games 34--(December 22, 1997)

So now that we're out here in the middle of the Eastern Pacific, and working on a barely functioning computer, and we've lost about half the articles we had written up in rough form, it's time to go back and recreate from our notes some of the stuff we saw on Saturday, December 20.

The articles we meticulously wrote on the Mt. Zion v. Salmen game are now history, as is the Westchester v. Las Vegas article. We did manage to save the Simi v. Fresno Washington Union Game, but we also lost the Harvard-Westlake v. Nevada Basic game, and the stuff we had on Compton's game against Jesuit, Newbury Park's game against Upper St. Clair, and the Long Beach Poly games--two on Saturday (like Simi, they also had byes on Friday, requiring that they play two games on Saturday in order to complete first and second round play before the Sunday break).

So we'll try to recreate some of this stuff, and where we can't we'll just list the scores and some of the important stats along with some impressions (mostly random).

If you recall, we left off with Friday, December 19 game results, with Game 22.

Saturday, December 20, 1997:

The games started with Game 23, between Peninsula of Rolling Hills Estates, CA and the Las Vegas Western Warriors. Las Vegas won 61-57, and we didn't see any of this game, so we're limited to reporting stats. Peninsula is not a powerhouse team, and their biggest player is Jake Dederer (6'-6" Sr. C), who did not score at all in the game. Peninsula's leading scorers were Adam Artian with 12 points, Grant Perica with 12, Steve Aschenbrenner with 11 points, and Mike Stocksdale with 10. Others scoring for Peninsula included Pat Schober with 4 and Chris Thomson with 8.

The game MVP was Vance Lawhorn of Western (6'-8" Sr. C), who had 22 points in only 15:11 minutes of play. During that time, he also pulled down 14 rebounds, and had 2 steals.

Game 24: Pleasure Ridge 57, Mercersburg 53. Pleasure Ridge is from Louisville, Kentucky and they've got a few players being recruited by D-I schools, including Duane King (6'-4" Jr. G), who is reportedly being looked at by Kentucky, Clemson, and Cincinatti, and the program booklet boasts that he's got a 4.0 GPA. He was not the MVP of this game, and only scored 8 points in 26 minutes of play. The MVP went to Dominick Taylor (5'-9" Sr. G) who had 13 points and 6 rebounds in 29:12 minutes. While Mercersburg was highly regarded at the beginning of the season (and don't forget, it's still early) it's most touted players didn't fare particularly well here. Mike Simmons (6'-1" Sr. G) who has signed with Miami had only 9 points in 30 minutes of playing time, while Kyle Logan (6'-6" Sr. F) who has signed with Stanford, and will certainly play the off-guard position on a team with 7'-0" centers and 6'-9" forwards, only had 9. An equally lackluster performance was registered by the highly regarded Ugonna Onyekwe (6'8" Sr. F), who was reportedly "recruited" to come from Africa to play here and who has signed with Long Beach State: he had only 11 points in 27 minutes, but did manage to pull down a game high 14 rebounds, so he's at least got that part of the role down. Again, we didn't see all of this game, but what we did see left us believing that Mercersburg is a much better team that its performance would indicate. Maybe it was jet lag, maybe they just figured they weren't going to beat Mt. Zion anyway, but they sure seemed off and out-of-sync.

Game 25: Los Angeles High 80, Littlerock Arkansas Central High 100.

Remember Govenor Orville Faubus? He wouldn't remember the place now. And good riddance to him anyway, because at least Central now has a team. Joe Johnson (6'-6" Sr. G/F/C), who's a big, tall smooth player, proved he can do it all, scoring 29 points in 25 minutes of play, pulling down 15 rebounds, and 4 assists, to earn the game MVP award. There were a couple of other outstanding players for Central, including Andre Amos (6'-3" Jr. G/F) who had 18 points, Mark Green (6'-2" Jr. G/F) with 20 points and Derrick Floyd (6'-2" Sr. G) with 13 points. LA's Leroy Dawson (6'-1" Jr. G) also had 29 points in the losing effort for LA, which dropped to 7-1 on the season, but which had some spotty performances from most of its other players at both the defensive and offensive end. Little Lamar Miller (5'-6" Sr. G), just shot the lights out and had 21 points, very impressive for a small quick guard, shooting 6 for 15 on three pointers. Deon Green who according to the program guide is reportedly "considering USC, Syracuse, UCLA and Texas" (although we think that that's currently just so much hype because what UCLA needs now more than anything is not another 6'-2" shooting guard)had 16 points, and no three-pointers, not a stellar performance by any means for him.

Game 26: Galena (Reno, NV) 90, Rangeview (Aurora, Colorado) 64. This was pretty much a blowout, and Brian Vaka of Galena had 27 points in 20 minutes, including 3 for 6 on his three-pointers, and was named game MVP. Galena played a later game against Central on Saturday evening (Game 51) which was really a pretty good contest.

Game 27: Long Beach Poly 75, Clark County, Nevada High 64:

This was mostly an inside game, with only 5 three point shots made in the whole game. The Clark Chargers figured to give Poly a tough ride, and for those trivia buffs out there, they won a SoCal tourney last year, the Redondo Beach Classic (were not sure if it was the Seahawk or the Pacific Shores Classic, but were sure that Jim Neilson will let us hear about this), but that was with a different team, and this year's squad features only one player taller than 6'-4", and that's Justin Jefferson (6'-7" Sr. F). the rest of the team is mostly between 5'-11" and 6'-4" with the average somewhere around 6'-1" or 6'-2". Compare this to Long Beach Poly's front line of Chris Stevens (6'-10" Sr. C), Joe Travis (6'-7" So. F/C), Keyon Cooley (6'-7" Jr. F), Richard Anderson (6'-9" Sr. F/C), and Jaisan Waltower (6'-6" Sr. F), and that's a formidable line. And they're not just a bunch of tall stiffs either. The Poly "Jackrabbits" don't have that name for nothing. They're led by guards Shelton Digs (6'-3" Sr. G), and Wesley Stokes (5'9" So. PG), and both are fast and able ball handlers.

Cooley was named the game MVP and he had 19 points, while Richard Anderson, who looks a bit gangly and gawky but is actually quite deft and balanced, had 22 points and 14 rebounds with 2 assists for Poly. Stokes had 10 points and 4 rebounds, and even though some of the recruiting folks in attendance didn't think he was much of a point because he doesn't shoot much from the outside, he impressed us with his ball handling, passing and defense.

Kevin Gaines of Clark had 27 points, a game high. Clark dropped to 6-2 on the season, while Long Beach improved to 7-1.

Game 28: Archbishop Spalding (Severn, Maryland) 59, Lithonia (Lithonia, Georgia) 55. Spalding got to this game by beating Rancho Bernardo on Friday 61-56, and this was another tight game. Tremaine Robinson (6'-2" So. G-F) was name the touney MVP with only 11 ponts and 8 rebounds. Not a very pretty game.

Game 29: Washington Union (Fresno, CA) 83, Saint Thomas (Houston, Texas) 52. This was another blowout. Chris Jeffries (6'-8" Sr. G/F/C) was named MVP with 19 points, while Shame Stallworth had 28 points. The only bright spot for Saint Thomas was that after Manual's loss to Simi Valley on Saturday morning, Manual abandoned the tournament, which game Saint Thomas an automatic bye into the quarterfinals of the consolation bracket.

Game 30: Simi Valley's first game was not much of a struggle, and they defeated Manual from Denver 84-67. Branduinn Fullove had 29 points, was named the game's MVP and played just a great game, hittling 2 out of 5 three point attempts and going 11 for 17 from the field. He also had 7 rebounds, and was just everywhere. Rafael Berumen had 20 points, Ian Boys had 14, and Kurt Mjoen had 11. Surprisingly Brett Michel didn't score in 21 minutes of play. And Manual's poor planning, as noted above, required that they drop out after the loss. Hrrrmph.

Game 31: Lincoln Prep (San Diego, CA) 68, Bartlett (Anchorage, Alaska) 71. Didn't see this game as it conflicted with that all important concept. . . food. We were counting on Jason Day for his report of this one, but still haven't heard from him on this one yet. (Hint, hint!). Don't really know anything about these teams either except that Jay Lewis (6'-1" Sr. G) was named the game MVP with 23 points and 8 rebounds, and 1 steal.

Game 32: Brittania (Vancouver, BC) 36, East Jefferson (Metairie, Louisiana) 59. Another game that conflicted with lunch, and we're glad we didn't see it because judging from the score, we would have lost our appetites. Only two players hit in double figures in the whole game, and not one did so for Brittania, which, if anything can be called a bright spot, distributed it's poor scoring among all those who played; seven players scored, and nobody got more than 8 points. Leo Williams of East Jefferson was the game MVP and he has 24 points in only 19 minutes.

Game 33: Jesuit v. Compton-- Compton won this game rather handily, 74-62, but for the first 8 minutes of the first half, Compton only had six players! Good thing no one fouled out quickly. Seems the team van got lost on the way to the Cimmaron Memorial gym, which is about 7 miles right down the road from Durango (either that, or as our spies tell us, the driver was stuck playing blackjack in a casino). Tito Maddox just went nuts in this game, with 29 points and was named game MVP. David Hamilton had 16 points and 7 rebounds, while DeAndre Moore had just a tremendous first half scoring 13 points, including 3 for 5 on three pointers all in the first half. Jesuit's De Shawn Jordan was the team's high scorer with 19, to drop to 5-2 on the season, while Compton improved it's record to 7-0.

Game 34: Rancho Bernardo (San Diego) just demolished Centennial (British Columbia), 93 to 59, proving once again that the decision to invite these small Canadian teams is not a good one if this tournament wants to remain one of the tops in the country. Sure, every tourney needs it's powder-puff teams, but this wasn't a very fair matchup. One bright spot for Centennial was Shaw Mervin (6'-8" Sr. C) did have 26 points and 13 rebounds, but one player just couldn't do it alone as Rancho had four players in double figures, including game MVP Rivera Rei with 24 points and 6 rebounds. The The entire RB team scored: Tewaun Farris with 6, Marques Askins with 5, Mike Dulin with 4, Jeff Flecther with 16, Mark Aselstine with 10, Justin Jordan and Jeremey Burnell with 6, David Gorman with 4, and Bill Bloom with 12. Rancho led 57-29 at the half and hung on to extend the lead to another six points, outscoring Centennial 36-30 in the second half.

More game reports from Saturday, December 20 later.

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