TO Rotary Tournament

26th Annual Thousand Oaks Rotary Invitational
Basketball Tournament--(November 26, 1997)

Here's some news of a great annual tournament, which this year will be wide open, and will feature some of the best players from SoCal, including the San Fernando and Conejo Valleys, Goleta, and Australia. The 26th Annual T.O. Rotary Invitational will be held at the Thousand Oaks Gymnasium from December 8-12, 1997. The gym is located at 2323 Moorpark Road, Thousand Oaks. There are really only two ways to get there (three if you're in Simi). Take the 101 either north from LA, or South from Santa Barbara, and get off at Moorpark Road, and head north for about 1 mile. The school will be on the left. If you're coming from Simi, take Olsen Road south, and turn right at Moorpark Road.

Last year, this tournament was easily dominated by Harvard-Westlake, and perhaps that scared off some of the potential competition, since until a few days ago, they were short one team. That was last year, though, and this is now. While H-W is still good (and may surprise a few people), we feel pretty confident in saying that they aren't predicted to win another State Championship this year. The competition at the T.O. Tourney will be wide open, and could feature a final matchup between any of the teams, including either H-W, Grant, Thousand Oaks or Oak Park as the eventual Pool "A" winners against Dos Pueblos, Newbury Park, Echuca High School from Bendigo (who? where? -- it's a team from Australia, where it's now summer) and the Thousand Oaks JV team who are all in Pool "B". Until last week, the schedule had "TBA" for the fourth team in Pool "B"-- while T.O. had originally penciled in Burbank High, apparently Ron Quarterman had other plans and is now going to another tournament after he coaches the ARC 14's this weekend at the Slam-N-Jam Thanksgiving Tournament. So, when T.O. Athletic Director Jim O'Brien couldn't find another team to replace Burbank, they had to go with the T.O. JV. While the Juniors won't win it, they will be competitive. O'Brien promises they will.

Pool A

Harvard Westlake (Victor Munoz, Pat Biggerstaff, John Terzian, Justin Logan, Dan Kinzer, Todd Kurihawa, Alex Minn, Ike Udeze, Russell Lakey, Eric Geffner, John Karavas, Chad Garson, Anthony Naylor, and Alex Holmes)
Grant High (Gilbert Arenas, Michael Yildiz, Krishna Evans, LaRon Harris, Adir Levy)
Thousand Oaks (Kelone Dixon, Jason Dixon, Chris Fidyk, Marcus Flournoy, Bas Van Rhee, Tyler Williams, Roy Hamilton)
Oak Park (Zack Smith, Jeff Smith, Eric Carver, Collin Wedel, Scott Jones, Richie Johnson, Scott Conove, Greg Jones, Jeremy Murphy, Dan Schneider, John Murphy, Dave Smith, Todd Corley)

Pool B

Dos Pueblos (ShanTay Legans, Jeremy Archuletta, Tafari Pipersburg, David Sears, Ryan Holbrook, Alex Jenkins, Zach Bruce, Dan Hoefer, Kapena O'Neal)
Newbury Park (Will Svitek, Dan Block, Brian Bobik, Jesse Roche, Dan Bobik, Chris Pollastrini, Luther Staine, Nick Czernek, Robert Congelliere, Brian Polen, Mike Meru, and Lee Turner)
Echuca High, Bendigo, Australia(a bunch of guys from Australia, including Ben Hunt, Justin Lock, Ravis Banko, Ben Ridge, Josh Knight, Pete Cutting, Matt Clark, Ben Clark, Joel Shea and Gary Hallet)
T.O. JV

Monday December 8, 1997

4:30 pm Oak Park v. Grant
6:00 pm T.O. JV v. Newbury Park
7:30 pm Harvard Westlake v. T.O

Tuesday December 9, 1997

4:30 pm T.O. JV v. Bendigo
6:00 pm Grant v. T.O.
7:30 pm Newbury Park v. Dos Pueblos

Wednesday December 10, 1997

4:30 pm Harvard Westlake v. Oak Park
6:00 pm Newbury Park v. Bendigo
7:30 pm T.O. JV v. Dos Pueblos

Thursday, December 11, 1997

4:30 pm Bendigo v. Dos Pueblos
6:00 pm Grant v. Harvard-Westlake
7:30 pm T.O. v. Oak Park

Friday December 12, 1997

3:30 pm 4th Place "B" v. 4th Place "A"
5:00 pm 3rd Place "B" v. 3rd Place "A"
6:30 pm 2nd Place "B" v. 2nd Place "A"
8:00 pm 1st Place "B" v. 1st Place "A"

Tie Breakers

1. Head to Head records
2. Lowest average points allowed, all games
3. Highest average point differential, all games
4. Coin Toss

This should be a great tournament. Don't miss it, especially the Grant v. H-W matchup, and the Newbury Park v. Dos Pueblos game. Unfortunately H-W will not matchup against Newbury or Dos Pueblos except possibly in Friday's games. Should be exciting.