Words. Jack Jensen

Over the weekend, the biggest and best of the country’s AAU circuit converged in Los Angeles for the third session of Nike’s Elite Youth Basketball League. With over 40 teams represented and only the EYBL finals (Nike Peach Jam) left to be played this summer, teams were definitely hungry for wins.

The event went down in much effort to the Hangar Athletic Xchange (HAX) in Hawthorne/South L.A. and ran Saturday through Monday. And the majority of the country’s big guns were represented in terms of both teams and players. Mike Gilchrist, Rakeem Christmas and Team Final were in attendance, as were Marquis Teague (Spiece Indy Heat), Boo Williams and Each 1 Teach 1 (Austin Rivers, Trevor Lacey) among others. Here is a recap of the event, along with some notable underrated player performances and a video collaboration with our friends over at One Entertainment Hoops.

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As the EYBL Los Angeles event wrapped up Monday morning, the biggest winners had to be the New Jersey Playaz and Team Takeover. Takeover went 4-1 on the weekend, with only a close loss to Each 1 Teach 1 separating themselves from an undefeated outing. But more importantly, both Takeover and the Playaz helped solidify their respective spots near the upper echelon of the EYBL league standings

The best individual player over the course of the event had to be D-One Sports’ Quincy Miller out of Winston-Salem, N.C, who was just flat out ridiculous. The kid is 6-10 with length, can handle the rock and bang in the paint. Not to mention, he has range that extends past the three-point arc; it’s no wonder that he’s being compared to a young Kevin Durant.

Team Final was easily the most stacked team in the field. Beyond having the number one rated prospect in Mike Gilchrist and another top-ten guy in Rakeem Christmas, coach Robert Brown’s squad has at least five legit major D-1 guys.

It kind of goes without saying every year, but Coach Boo Williams definitely has another bona fide squad this summer. Both junior Justin Anderson and future UNC Tar Heel James McAdoo lead BW to a 5-0 record over the weekend. One team representing the host state of California was the Drew Gooden/Oakland Soldiers. Both seniors Kyle Wiltjer (Jesuit/West Linn, OR) and Jabari Brown (Oakland/Oakland, CA) showed up big and almost upset Boo Williams if not for a buzzer-beating three by Brian Darden.

Seattle Rotary Select guard and five-star recruit, Tony Wroten, Jr., was ejected for throwing a ‘bow during a break in play. Duke recruit Michael Gbinije, from Team Takeover, is a subtle giant out there. He’s not going to blow teams away like Austin Rivers will, but he’ll quietly drop 30 without anyone really taking notice. A good shooter and pretty strong for his size at 6-6. Speaking of Rivers, wow. This is the first time I’ve seen young Doc live and, in my mind, he was the best player in attendance other than Miller. Sadly, however, that was short-lived as he only played about 12 minutes before going down with an ankle injury in his first game. In that 12 minutes, Rivers dropped 17 points, including two step-back NBA threes with a defender on his hip in consecutive trips down the court.

After the game, both he and his coach, Therion Joseph, had a few thoughts on the injury. “Well Austin calls himself a shot-blocker. So he tried to go block Michael Gbinije’s shot and accidentally stepped on his foot. But you could tell when he does something that he doesn’t normally do, something always happens to him. So he tried to make a defensive play. (The ankle’s) a little tender, but he’s a tough guy,” said Joseph. In other news, Rivers was rocking Duke shorts while watching his teammates from the sidelines on Saturday.

We also overheard that Each 1 Teach 1 guard Trevor Lacey took an unofficial to UCLA while he was in town.

While D-One Sports’ Quddus Bello might get all the YouTube love for flying high above the rim, I bet that Lester Wilson from the Tennessee Travelers can give him a good run. At one point during warm-ups, Wilson went eye-level with the rim after taking off from the dotted circle. He was Josh Smith-high in the air.

Kentucky recruit Marquis Teague, considered by many to be the best rising senior point guard in the country, did nothing to dispel that ranking this weekend. The younger brother of Atlanta Hawks’ guard Jeff Teague was constantly double-teamed and was constantly able to maneuver around it calmly. He has a great mid-range flooter in traffic and was probably the best passing guard of the group. “He’s one of the best out there,” said Rivers.

Team Takeover’s Mikael Hopkins was a favorite of mine to watch. The 6-9 senior from DeMatha in Maryland genuinely wants to block everything that comes within his vicinity around the rim. He is building a better post game and with some ball-handling and bulk, will be a very good player down the road.

Scary moment when BABC guard Kamali Bey came down hard on his leg, resulting in what looked like a severe break. Here’s to a fast recovery.

If you haven’t been keeping tabs on Rivers’ recruiting trail so far in his Dime/High School Hoop’s exclusive diary you may not have foreseen his future in the sports journalism world, but he has. “Maybe after my sports career is over, I could do something like that. Maybe broadcasting or something where I’m writing; something like that. I love sports. Whether it’s writing or doing something on TV commenting, it’s something I’d like to do after my career is over.”

With most of the more high-profile players getting a lot of pub lately, here are a few guys that caught my eye during the weekend:

- Jarnell Stokes, Memphis YOMCA (Central/Memphis, TN): He is only going to be a junior this upcoming season and was an absolute beast against both Christmas and Gilchrist of Team Final. Lot of talent and size with Stokes.

- Mikael Hopkins, Team Takeover (DeMatha/Hyattsville, MD): He’s long and supremely athletic. Plays alongside the more highly publicized Duke-bound Michael Gbinije, but understands team role. Great shot-blocking and rebounding instincts and plays far above the rim in traffic.

- Tyrone Johnson, Team Final (Plainfield/Plainfield, NJ): On a squad as high profile as Team Final (including Syracuse commit Trevor Conney), Johnson handles his own as the starting point. Solid ball-handler and shooter, who limits his mistakes on offense.

- Aaron Brown, Team Final (Pennwood/Darby, PA): Even with the obvious highlighted talent, Brown emerged as my favorite player from Team Final. He’s smart off the ball and is an extremely athletic wing threat. He is fearless driving to the rim and, more importantly, can finish around the basket. A big pick up to whoever grabs him next year.

- Brett Kingma, FOH Seattle (Jackson/Mill Creek, WA): I like Kingma’s game. He knows what he’s capable of and takes advantage of broken plays well. It looked like he had a deadly stroke from trey range and it’s not surprising that he’s getting looks everywhere from BYU to Gonzaga.

- Markus Crider, King James (Wayne/Huber Heights, OH): I was only able to catch the King James squad for a half, but what I was able to see, sold me on Crider. He is an athletic wing player, who is most effective when slashing toward the basket. Definitely a player to keep an eye on.

- Wayne Blackshear (Morgan Park/Chicago, IL), Sam Thompson (Whitney Young/Chicago, IL) and Jamie Crockett (Crete-Monee/University Park, IL), Mac Irvin Fire: All three of these guys impressed me over the weekend. They’re tough, athletic and all play hard on both sides of the ball. Blackshear is the biggest name out of the group, but both Thompson and Crockett each had the crowd reeling (and in Crockett’s case, I mean reeling) from a pair of dunks.

- Vaughn Gray (Don Bosco Prep/Elmood Park, NJ) and Myles Davis (St. Peter’s/Plainfield, NJ), New Jersey Playaz: Out of all the great teams and big names that flooded the EYBL this weekend, the Playaz might have become my favorite team to watch. Between their two higher-profile bigs, Desmond Hubert and Kyle Anderson Jr., and guard play, the Playaz grinded out some great performances. But the two guys I was impressed with the most, were Gray and Davis. Davis is lights out from distance and should be a menace wherever he goes in the college game next season. Gray on the other hand, isn’t being as highly recruited, but I really like what he was trying to do in L.A. He got to the rim easily, played strong defense and never gave up on the hustle end of the court. Will be a subtle, but strong pick-up next year.

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Wednesday, June 2nd, 2010

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