SoCalHoops Tournament News

Mission Prep Christmas
Classic Field Announced--(Oct. 17, 2000)

As we've written on the message board, we've been very busy with real work (yeah, "real" is a relative term sometimes), and we just have not had the time to write as much lately as we had planned.  But when we got a fax from our friend Tom Mott at Mission Prep College Prep Catholic HS up in San Luis Obispo yesterday, we just knew we had to get this posted as soon as possible for those of you trying to figure our where you'll be this holiday season, especially those of you who want to see some of the top teams in the country in the great environment of Cal Poly SLO.   Great weather in the winter, great teams. Short drive from LA.  Can't miss it.

Those of you who remember last year's inaugural event, will remember the Mission Prep tournament as the "Rim Rattler Christmas Classic". . . Well, that event (the Rim Rattler Holiday Classic) has now been "moved"  to Long Beach, and it will now be held at the Goldmine at Long Beach State, replacing the now-defunct Best in the West Tournaments formerly run by Artesia HS's former coach Wayne Merino.  Actually there are two different tournaments this year, and the Mission Prep Tournament will remain just that, i.e., the "Mission Prep" tournament, but with two new sponsors, Copeland's Sports and Reebok.    

Here's the official press release (slightly edited to add some of our own commentary where we thought it appropriate):

Mission Prep Anounces 2000 Tournament Field

The 2000 Mission Prep Christmas Classic Tournament field has been completed.  The tournament which will be held at Cal Poly's Mott Gym from December 20-23 will feature teams from three different states (California, Florida & Alaska).

Heading up the field will be the Crenshaw Cougars, coached by the legendary Willie West.  Coach West still has the record (8) for the most state titles of any coach in California high school history.  The Cougars feature an exciting and athletic team this year, with some of the top players in the LA region, including Jamal Walls, a tough and strong inside player, Terrence Jones, another inside strong rebounder and scorer, and Marcus Williams, a young a very promising point guard.

One of the other top teams in this field is Washington Union from Fresno. While they won't have DeShawn Stevenson (who is now in Utah playing in the NBA), they have some excellent returning players, including Keith Sconiers, and exciting Archie Copeland, and they've also got their old coach, Vonn Webb who returned from a year of coaching as an assistant at Wyoming.

Artesia will also be playing, but they will be an entirely different type of team than last year's squad which was ranked No. 1 in the country for much of the season.  Gone is coach Wayne Merino, and with him the four talented foreign players (Jack Martinez, Amaury Fernandez, Jon Steffanson and Franklin Matos).   This year's team will feature a mostly home-grown cast, including guys like Ryan Reyes (6'-3" Sr. SG), Tony Roberts (6'-3" Sr. SG) and Ryan Mueiller (6'-7" Jr. F).

Sherman Oaks Notre Dame will also be looking for a Christmas Classic title.  Coach Rob DiMuro's team is one of thsi year's favorites in the Mission League and one of the top teams in Division III of CIF this coming season and they feature Cody Pearson (6'-4" Sr. SG/SF), a solid D-I prospect, Mike Luderer (6'-3" Sr. SG), who averaged more than 20 ppg last season, and another solid college prospect in point guard Ruben Sanchez (6'-0" Sr. PG). 

The Christmas Classic will also feature two teams who will travel from opposite ends of the contintental U.S.:  Miami's  Jackson HS of Florida will pick up where Miami Senior and Miami Christan left off last year (both teams met in the championship, and while we think it's unlikely that Jackson will meet itself in the finals, they are still an excellent team).  We don't exactly know who is on Miami Jackson, and indeed we checked over at Breakdown.com, which is a site devoted exclusively to Florida hoops, in much the same way that SoCalHoops focuses on Southern California, and interestingly, the only reference we could find to a "Jackson HS" was for Jacksonville's Jackson HS, which is where one of the top recruits in the country, Antonio Lawrence (6'-5" Jr. SG/SF) currently attends school when he's not up in Fresno playing with Darren "Mats" Matsubara's EBO team.

The other team making a rather long trip, and from the opposite end of the country from Miami Jackson is Fairbanks, Alaska's Lathrop HS, which is where Kyle Bailey (6'-3" Fr. SG) is from--Kyle signed with and will play at Santa Clara this year.  Lathrop also features  Cameron Watts (5'-11" Sr. PG), but beyond him, we don' t know who else will be on the team.  But Lathrop is a perennial power in Alaska, so they should be really exciting.

Other top teams playing in this year's tournament include:

Price (Los Angeles), which is the current State Champion in Division V, and the Southern Section Champion in Division V-AA:
Foothill (Bakersfield), a team we know literally nothing about;
JW North (Riverside), a team we know a thing or two about, except that they will be much improved;
Valley (Sacramento), again a team we don't know anything about, except that one of their top players is a soph, a kid named Esean Bolden (6'-3" So. SG);
South Pasadena (South Pasadena, CA);
Berkeley (Berkeley, CA)
Calvary Temple (Modesto), which of course features Chuckie Hayes (6'-8" Sr. PF) among others;
El Cerrito (Oakland), always a strong team; and
Kennedy (Richmond, CA).

The tournament will feature some great games, a slam dunk contest and a three point shootout which will be held on December 20.  For additional information on the tournament contact Mission Prep Head Coach Tom Mott at 805-543-2131.

See you there.

 
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