A busy day at the Greensboro Coliseum on Monday and I got there at 11:30am and stayed with it until the last seconds ticked off the clock with at around 9pm….
Mike Ellis from the Jamestown News was there most of the day and Johnny “O” from the Sports Carolina Monthly was in the house as was Mike from HoopStars, based up in Caswell County, in Bartlett Yancey territory and the home turf in days gone by, for the great-one Sleepy Taylor….Tom Keller from the News and Record was in house as was the man with the big camera in hand from WFMY NEWS 2, Brian Hall….Jerry Woolford the hot shot with the N&R camera was on the scene as was photographer Jumpin’ Joe Daniels from the Carolina Peacemaker….Coach Roy Williams and Bob Gibbons were at games and someone said they saw Dave Telep in the building and there were plenty of college scouts coming and going all day long….Nice job by the way, on PA, by Tripp Durham and Gary Ross. Gary “The Boss” Ross missed the first toss as Tripp worked 1-3 and ‘The Boss” called games 4-6…..
Good day at the Coliseum and we have some good debates going on and we also have a load of photos from the event and as you have probably learned by now, our camera does good things with still shots, but not with the action moving at a fast or steady clip….
Many people are ranking the teams according to their performances on Monday and if I had to rank the dunks by their dramatics, release and force, I would include the power dunks of:
1)James McAdoo from Norfolk Christian
2)Jay Canty from Oak Ridge Military Academy
3)Jacob Lawson from Oak Ridge Military Academy
4)PJ Hairston from Dudley HS….
and that would be my top four and it almost looked like there was a competition going on with Canty and Lawson from ORMA, with Canty grabbing the early lead and then Lawson going to the rack with extreme force late in the game….
McAdoo seemed to do what he did with ease….He was lurking around in the backcourt and he would grab a weak pass or sneak in a wrap-steal and then he would go to town….McAdoo really got my attention and he is only a junior, headed to Roy Williams’ program at North Carolina in the future….His dad is Ronnie McAdoo, who played at Hillsborough Orange and then went on to play at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia…His uncle is Bob McAdoo who played for Smith HS here in Greensboro and then later on at UNC and for the Buffalo Braves, the LA Lakers and others in the NBA….
The McAdoo kid was impressive and as I was commenting, he seemed to do his work with ease and maybe we will see him back here at the Coliseum again next year.
The workhorse of the day was Tyler Lewis from Forsyth Country Day. Tyler has 13 assists on the day and nobody played a more complete game than he did. I want to see more of this kid, seeing as I was the one that discovered him at the MLK Day Games, when he was playing on the Coliseum main floor, back as an eighth-grader….
I am here to tell you that this Tyler Lewis kid can do it all. A prime example and this happened more than once, was when he would come down on the break and make the perfect pass to his FCD teammates, they would miss the easy set-up layup and he would show up on the other side of the basket, grab the rebound and put the missed shot back in for two…I told someone that on every made bucket by Forsyth Country Day, that the Coliseum PA man on this game Tripp Durham, shoud say basket by Nick Sink(for example), assist by Tyler Lewis…..Assist after assist, by Tyler Lewis and the passes he was making were the best you will ever see….They are ACC-style, but at 5’9, Lewis is going to have trouble getting into the ACC. His brother Colby is at 6’3/6’4, so maybe Tyler has a growth spurt coming in the next couple of years…
Not to take anything away from Brennan Wyatt, from Dudley, but Tyler Lewis from FCD was the top point guard on the floor at the Coliseum on Monday and McAdoo was the top big man(6’8), but McAdoo doesn’t play like a big man, he plays the game like a wing guard….The Norfolk Christian point guard, Mike Murray, who wore the same number as #12 T. Lewis, was another solid point guard on Monday…..
Brennan Wyatt is improving his game and he is starting to look more and more for his offense and that will be a big plus for Dudley down the road as the defenses continue to sag off on PJ Hairston and blanket him with 2-3 defenders…PJ turned his ankle on Monday and he was feeling excruciating pain, but in the end as they gave him a pair of crutches to allow him to walk off the Coliseum floor, he threw the crutches away and walked off under his own power and I would say there is definitely a higher power watching over PJ, based on the number of times I have seen him get hurt, just in the past two years, and he keeps coming back for more, like a boxer that is down for the count and you just can’t knock him out……He was laying on the floor smacking the floor in pain and then he was up and walking away, toward the dresssing room, the pain having to back off and try and stop this kid on another day…..
Oak Ridge is strong and they are solid with all that talent they can throw at you and it will be interesting to see how they stack up when they face Oak Hill in a few weeks/days…..ORMA has to have Michael Neal at the point to have a chance against an Oak Hill. There is nothing fancy about Oak Hill, but they can be up the court on you and at the basket in just one pass and their outside shooting with Pe-Shon Howard will bury your chances for success and the Warriors are so quick with guys like Doron Lamb and their inside guys led by Roscoe Smith never let up and they can get you in trouble in a hurry…
The surprise of the day,(and maybe the steal of the year if you are N.C. State and they had Wolfpack coaches in attendance) was Joseph Uchebo from Oak Ridge. The kid was listed at 7’0, but he looks more like 6’9 or 6’10 and the way he wears his long socks adds to his shorter appearance in stature….This kid can play and he can handle the ball like a guard for a real big man. You don’t want him bringing the ball up against a top-notch team like an Oak Hill, but this kid from Oak Ridge is the real deal and he might just be the deal of the new decade or the new century, for those who had not seen him play before Monday’s action at the Greensboro Coliseum.
If I were N.C. State, I would hire or appoint a coach to be at every one of Joseph Ochebo’s games over the next three years and make sure you always have positive things to say to the kid so you can keep him in the fold….Ochebo was the big find of the day on Monday…..Keep a track on this kid and follow/watch for his box scores in the local papers and on the internet…..
I had seen Greenboro Day(Brandon Dorsett becoming very valuable at guard) and Page on numerous occasions earlier in the year, so I am not going to flood the waves with details on what the Bengals and Pirates did in their two wins, but Ragsdale is looking better and they even brought a 13 year-old in late in their game with FCD and this kid might be one we should start watching. He’s in the 9th grade, but still just 13 years old and his last name might be McGowan, still not sure because he has picked up Luke Sonricker’s old #44 jersey and they still don’t have the new #44, the 13-year old version, on the Ragsdale roster. But, Ragsdale might just take their conference title with Tyquan Roberts, Kalik Parker, Beniah Wise and Seth White all playing hard in January/February…..
To close it all down for another year and to begin to turn our attention to the big one coming up on Friday night with Northern Guilford at Greensboro Day, we will leave you with a few notes on Monday’s action….
Guard of the Day:PG Tyler Lewis-Forsyth Country Day
Big Man of the Day:James McAdoo-Norfolk Christian
Surprise of the Day:Joseph Ochebo-Oak Ridge Military Academy
Will Hairston be 100% Wed night for WG? If not, we will see if Dudley is a one man show or not.
Dudley is amazing even if they don’t have Hairston. I was impressed with their freshman guard at the MLK. I think another name to watch out for is Dillard and he is a Soph. They also have a great PG in Wyatt
The freshman guard Jaquel Richmond is going to be something special and the other freshman who is the shooting guard, Sam Hunt, he is another young talent that the Panthers have in place…
Richmond and Hunt will be good ones….
Western has two young guns too in Gilmore and Baldwin….Those two kids will be right at the top in future for WG….
If PJ doesn’t play, then Reggie and Richmond will really have to step up and Brennan Wyatt will have to take over and shoot for 20-plus points, with 14 to the bucket and and a least 9 from three-point range….
Who do you guys think will lead the way for Western at Dudley??????
Will it be Reggie Perksins or Antwan Wilkerson or a combination of all the Hornets?????
Hello Andy want to again thank you for having this site, so we can keep up with our teams and local players. I must admit I am not as excited about your site as I use to be because the Hatorade is crazy and there is too much of the good old boy network for your favorites. It still gives us a place to peep in from time to time. You constantly mention your prize gem Tyler Lewis who I think is good and has potential to get better. You gotta know that you give this guy a lot of ink, and not that he doesn’t deserve it, but there are other players who deserve a better representation on your part. Brennan Wyatt is one of the players who gets your leftovers and it makes you guys look too bias. He went against some of the best guards around he wasn’t playing Ragsdale who looked as though Tyler wasn’t even a focus for them, (he should have been). Wyatt always gets your scraps, or you give him partial acknowledgement while praising other players. This kid is a pure point guard and he doesn’t have the hook ups that some of your other gems do. He sacrifices his game for the sake of of his team and performs the role that the coaches ask of him. I know this kid and he has a work ethic similar to Shammar Bowden. The kid can shot, I mean he can flat out fill it up, but Dudley doesn’t want that from him and he doesn’t whine, he just plays. So just because he doesn’t give you locals the eye candy you want before you acknowledge him doesn’t mean he can’t do other things. You constanly make reference to size and not performance. You see I am Muggsy Bogues’s lead trainer for his workout program and we beleive it is not the size of the dog in the fight but the size of the fight in the dog, and Wyatt has a lot of fight. I saw Tyler and Wyatt at CP3 elite and the difference was as night and day. The Lewis kid looked out of place (though we could give youth and the shock factor a nod), he still doesn’t stand out against top notch defenders. Wyatt was at home and demonstrated when he does not have the responsibility of feeding everybody he also has can fill it up. We have good coaches and good players in your area, and please don’t include me with the rest of the crabs who feel they must tear a kid down in order to build their kid up (Tyler is nice). Its just that Wyatt is better and on MLK day you missed it because he is not your discovery, he doesn’t get the same kinda love. He is the real player who makes others around him better. How ironic on MLK day we still can’t overcome. Come on Andy share some of those wonderful adverbs and adjectives you got for your boy. Then instead of “Just Us” we can get some Justice. Take care dude, will be peeping in!
Just looked on Max prep to check out the Wyatt kid stat for the Oak Hill game and he had 15pts, 10 assist, 5 rbds, and 2 steals against the ninth ranked team in the country. You are entittled to your opinon because that is what this site is for but he played against an entirely different level of competion. Oak Hill pg is headed to Dayton ( Wyatt held him to 8 pts), Lamb offers from Kansas, Conn. and Kentucky, P’shon headed to Maryland and a couple of other high D1 Forwards. He may not have been the best guard on the floor but give the kid the credit he derserved he played an excellent game and is not even the focal point on his team for scoring. How you made your call about Lewis who played Ragsdale — makes me scratch my head. Wyatt may not have been the best but i have to question your judgement to say Lewis was the best. And if you didn’t think he was the best why bring him up in the article period. Lewis is a really good player where he is also the focal point of his team and their lead go to guy and I do respect his game but it was not better than Wyatt’s. Come on lets really be fair to all of our kids…..
Monday was the first time this year that I have had the chance to see Tyler Lewis play and I really enjoyed his overall game.
It may be a case of having seen Brennan play so many games that I take for granted his fine efforts. I do appreciate his game and he was again very valuable to his Dudley Panther team in their win on Thursday night against Western Guilford.
Maybe Brennan and I are a lot alike. It is possible that we turn in a good game every day/night and the fans are so used to our performance being right on the money that they tend to overlook us…..
He is steady and he gets the job done and in the end that is all that counts….
Christian Pulliam is sort of the same way at GDS. Nothing fancy about his game, he just goes out and gets the job done, much like Brennan Wyatt…..
I guess you are right comparing steady Wyatt to Pulliam —- cause Wyatt got 5 offers to play D1 ball and Pulliam got how many. I guess it’s good for Wyatt that you are not a college coach because he probably would have received no offers. I’m starting to agree with the earlier comments about the Wyatt kid always getting your scrap praise.
Hey Andy just a quick response to your reply. You still don’t get it but that is your right and it appears your choice. Regardless of what people tell you and what you obviously refuse or maybe can’t see, I understand that you guys have your targeted gems. Why don’t you talk to some college coaches and some real basketball people and build your understanding about the game and how it is played at the next level, because though your reporting is good your evaluations are wanting and lacking. But that is not your job or the intention of your site I suspect. I have great respect for you and I am grateful you work so hard to give us a venue to discuss sports, but research the intangibles of the game and increase your knowledge by talking to some people away from this area who are professionals (to get away from bias). And there is a a big difference between Brennan and Pulliam, and your references to Wyatt are always less than your comments about Ty or others you “ink up.” When you talk about Ty you say “oh he can do it all, then you say Wyatt is gettin better or he is steady”but never the same accolades you give your gems whether they play a Y team and Wyatt is going against next years “sweet sixteen class” It is your right to have your opinion, but be careful not to devalue all your work by passing the obvious for the desired. Please know don’t want to offend just think you got something and I have a lot of players who could benifit if it doesn’t become an eye candy window store. Thank you
It is no big deal to me, but I stand by my ability to evaluate basketball players and point guards and guards in particular.
I never said Pulliam was as good as or better than Brennan Wyatt…I just said they both play hard and they do and they have similar games in that regard.
I have been on the court pretty much non-stop since 1980 and I know what I am talking about….
Much of it is opinion, but it is based on time spent working and studying and when it comes to knowing basketball, I don’t take a backseat to anyone…
I doubt many of our observers were out there in the rain last Sunday with a basketball in hand, but I was there and have been since 1980 and I know my guards pretty well.
Big men are not my forte, so I will leave that evaluation to someone else, but it is still fun to watch them play the game….
I will keep on studying those guards and I admitt, I still have a lot to learn, so I will keep on watching and practicing every chance I get…
I have already seen 8 gsmes this week and will back at it tonight…Y0u can learn a lot by watching, but you still have to be able to put the ball on the court and in the basket to make a complete evaluation and I will. I have and will continue to work harder than anyone in this business and to me it is not a business, it is a passion and I have more respect for this game than most of your NBA players do today…
Good discussion and thanks for all the input…..