Dec. 28 Results
Girls’ Championship Game: – Page 56, Northwest Guilford 45 – Page wins its tournament-record 11th girls’ title.
Boys’ Championship Game – Greensboro Day School 55, Northeast Guilford 50 – Greensboro Day ties the tournament record with its 10th boys’ title.
Girls’ 3rd-place Game – Greensboro Day School 57, Smith 37 – Best finish in the tournament for Greensboro Day School.
Boys’ 3rd-place game – Page 67, Smith 50
Girls’ 5th-place game – Northern Guilford 51, Grimsley 30
Boys’ 5th-place game – Northern Guilford 51, Grimsley 44
Girls’ 7th-place game – Ragsdale 44, Northeast Guilford 40
Boys’ 7th-place game – Northwest Guilford 67, Ragsdale 45
2011 Pizza Hut Invitational Girls’ All-Tournament Team
Tenesha Connor, Sr., Greensboro Day School
Natalie Harper, Sr., Northwest Guilford
Alyssa Morton, Sr., Northwest Guilford
Kayla Johnson, Jr., Page
Debresha Barnes, Jr., Page
MVP – Paris Kea, So., Page
Jim Pritchett Sportsmanship Award: Victoria McGee, Sr., Northwest Guilford
2011 Pizza Hut Invitational Boys’ All-Tournament Team
Frank Eaves, Sr., Page
Bryce Benjamin, Sr., Northeast Guilford
Cameron Smith, Sr., Northeast Guilford
J.T. Terry, Jr., Greensboro Day School
Reed Lucas, Jr., Greensboro Day School
Tracy Gathings, Sr., Smith
MVP – Jalen Ross, Sr., Greensboro Day School
Jim Pritchett Sportsmanship Award: Cameron Smith, Sr., Northeast Guilford
Gds does not belong in the little 4. You just ruin it for the other teams. Great job you won a tournament with players that you stole from the public schools. Go beat another private school like wesyelan then talk. GO MONTY!!
Greensboro Day Junior College pulled it out at the end. Good coaching by GD JC
Yeah bum gds can’t play against other private school in the state. They are all overrated except for Montrell and maybeee Reggie Dillard but he shouldnt have gone to that “stacked” team. He and Monty could be putting up 30 a night if they weren’t at gds. Yay Monty good win
Just when I thought I had heard everything. The choice where a kid attend school is a decision made byD their parents not the school. What the above post should worry about is, whether there will be any parents willing to leave their kids in public school sports because of the lack of the educational commitment! Wake up those kids left public schools for the private schools for a chance to succeed in college!
Yeah pirates! Paris Kea is a real star!
ballin
We took our son out of public school to attend private for better basketball competition, yes I am admitting it. He had a 3.5 GPA when he left public and still has a 3.5 GPA. Same score on SAT after several years at private school. Its about basketball, not academics. He has offers he never got at public schools and had excellent SAT scores when he took SAT at public school. Such bull to think we leave public for education. Private school play better basketball teams.
I speak facts,
GDS has beaten other private schools… Ravenscroft and Greenfield.
They won their conference last year beating both Wesleyan and HP Christian.
Congrats to GDS on winning a hard fault Pizza Hut. I thought Gathings for Smith was sensational the entire tournament. I think that PAGE is extremely talented with their football players.
10 titles for the Bengals is very impressive.
News Flash: Basketball is a TEAM sport NOT an individual sport.
Congrats to the Bengals on a hard fault win. It was a great game for a fan.
Congrats on 10 Little 4 titles for GDS.
Cameron Smith and Bryce Benjamin were very good.
As a parent with a kid in the private school system, I will simply confirm what “lynnd” said above. We choose the private school route for several reasons but here are the primary reasons: #1 – the education and school support at GDS is top of the line period, #2 – the school enbraces basketball for both boys and girls, #3 – the basketball schedule is far beyond what any public school in this area could even begin to attempt for both boys and girls, and #4 – the coaches are tied to the educational process. Kids finishing at GDS will not have to worry about any college questioning their educational record and college coaches will know that a GDS kid can make it through their college adm process. This will open more door and resources for these kids at their go thru their Jr and Sr years of high school. Yes- any kid that is highly motivated will get where they want to go but GDS ensures that piece of the puzzle is taken care of by design. That makes me feel more secure as a parent in todays world.
Congrats to PAGE girls and GDS boys for winning the Little 4. They both are great teams and should be a blast to watch the rest of the season.
Stop beating a dead horse. People have their reasons for going to schools like GDS. Congrats Coach Johnson! To all the sore losers and cry babies. The sun’ll come out tomorrow..bet your bottom dollar that tomorrow there’ll be sun..tomorrow..tomorrow..there’s always tomorrow..your only a year away!
Did the Head Baseball Coach from Dudley High School pass away tonight? I heard that he died from a heart attack. He was a an excellent coach but a wonderul guy
Someone said that GDS should not be in the tournament. Fortunately that person does not do the books. GDS brings as many loyal fans to these games as any other school year after year. GDS sells more tickets than any other school. Obviously if Dudley was still in the tournament, then they would bring a big crowd, and other schools like Page, Northern, NW and Smith and Grimsley have good fan bases for these games. GDS is doing it’s part with bring bodies in the door and most in importantly GDS gives the tournament a consistent target that everyone can shoot at year after year. It has been said that GDS is the Duke of this area – you either love or hate them. That brings fans and haters together to make for exciting games whether it is your school playing or not in the game. No other school in this year could produce such a reaction from across different fan bases.
Go GDS !!!
GDS does sell tickets and they sell a bunch of them. They have very good players and very good coaches. They are an asset to the tournament.
Congrats to all the people involved with the championship.
It’s doesn’t matter where a kid is at school if he applies himself. That’s just an excuse for parents to give there kids a second shot. He can gain just as good of an education in any public school. So thats bs. It’s up to the kid whether or not he want to succeed educational.
i thought the highlight of the girls game was the cartwheel contest between cheerleaders the northwest girl had maybe a 8 with page a strong 9 she had a good backflip
The sportsmanship award going to Cameron Smith couldn’t have been more deserving. That kid really competed the right way.
Congratulations to Coach Johnson, his staff, and all the players on the Bengal team. This is a great accomplishment. 10 championships – wow.
Too bad SEG was not invited, maybe next year.
Where was Mo. Doesn’t he support the Guilford Couty Schools. The only one from the Administration that I saw at the tournament was the County AD sulking after GDS beat Northeast. Northeast did a fine job and has a real good team but remember the cream always comes to the top..
GDS has a big advantage over the pubic schools. They recruit kids and reclass them. GDS should win this every year. I wonder how many games this coach would win without this advantage. Go play teams on your level (Oakhill) and lets see how you do. By on your level I mean recruiting the best kids off the pubic school teams.
Congrats GDS.
I don’t have any players in public or private. Haters everywhere when you don’t win. Real players keep working and don’t worry about the hand they are dealt.
Everyone worried about choices being made by others.
Here is the real reason that separates the teams. The strong programs all have good feeder programs that have committed basketball people. Some are well entrenched, some are new. Some players get it from individuals some from organizations. They all get extra work from sources outside the school. The coaches mold it into their schemes.
In case you don’t understand some of the alliances, here they are (no particular order):
Dudley – Greensboro warriors (more recently cp3)
GDS – Gaters (A team)
Page – some Gaters some Phoenix some Westmoreland trained players
Smith, Soutwest – New Light Disciples
HPC – Same as GDS
Wesleyan – top 3 from various national summer programs
North East – believe most play out of Burlington organization (name escapes me)
Grimsley – gets some Gaters players periodically
Northern, NW might have some gater influence
Southeast, Ragsdale, Southern, Western and Eastern have fairly week summer feeder programs.
A good middle school feeder system helps as well if you can’t recruit or don’t have others building players for you.
So to all the parents and fans hating on the coaches and players, need to figure out how to help your coaches out. They can all do well given talent but it does not come without commitment of time and money. If you are not willing to provide both, be content with complaining at your keyboards. A lot cheaper and easier.
With a sport like basketball, if you can put aside the ego’s early and let your children learn the game the correct way and learn to play all positions, they stand a better chance wherever they play. If they can play, have a good attitude, have good grades and get a little bit of luck, you can find the right situation to continue to play at the next level regardless of your teams overall win/loss record. Don’t get me wrong, winning helps getting to the highest next level but you are better off having a good academic plan and using hoops to get you to the best academic school that you are willing to handle.
Instead of complaining about the basketball situation, you should also be looking at how supportive the coach is getting you to the right fit. A lot of transferring goes on in hoops at the next level. Make sure you are seeing the big picture and planning accordingly for the next level whether it be hoops, academics or both. Sometime you also have to be realistic and understand that high school will be the end of the organized hoop game. There is life after bball.
Thank you all that help our youth even in difficult times dealing with misguided fans and parents.
Parents can reclass at private schools but public school kids just flunk and have the same advantage on the field. I have a nephew at Hairston that has failed twice from elementary to middle school and will play football at Dudley when he gets there next year. What’s the difference? He will be two years older than most freshman in high school and trust me…he is not the only kid that plays sports that has failed grades early and no one knows because it happens so early in their life.
New to the game, are we, Carolina Blue? Your fourth sentence implies “this coach” doesn’t know how to coach and is only good at recruiting. You obviously do not have the benefit of history — he has taken teams with far, far less talent than this one and defeated Dudleyat its strongest through sheer execution. And comparing GDS to Oak Hill is to reveal that you do not understand the rules of the association in which GDS plays, nor do you understand the competitive advantage that boarding schools (such as Oak Hill and Christ School) have over regular private schools in terms of their reach.
And for the millionth time, parents make the decision to send their kids to private school. Your last sentence is laughable. Get yourself educated on the facts.
GDSFan- If you and your private school that recruits players had any class you would not want to play against teams that you have such an advantage over.
Please end the debate on if public schools can compete with the privates. Both Page and NE proved that they could as both had chances to beat GDS. GDS has its advantages, and their refusal to acknowledge those advantages just shows the arrogance on their part. The public schools still have good basketball teams and coaches. Win with class Bengals, if you can’t see all the advantages you have, then maybe it is just a lack of intelligence. The public schools showed well, but as someone said GDS should win this tournament. What is wrong however is the recruiting stuff. I won’t say that GDS recruits because I don’t think there is any proof of that, people need to understand that families are making those decisions.
carolina blue-
Comparing GDS to Oak Hill, as GDSfan said, is ridiculous. I’m assuming you’re a Carolina Fan…. Should they not play against Elon this evening? They have far more advantages over little ol’ Elon and, based on your logic, have no class by scheduling them (See how dumb that sounds?)
Does GDS have advantages over public schools? Of course they do. They can reclass kids, they can hire great coaches for all sports far more easily (no rules about being a teacher at the school) and they can schedule more games (at least it seems that way). Those are all advantages and certainly enhance their program and chances of winning. However, its just the way it is. I certainly doubt that Elon leaves the Smith Center tonight saying how unfair it is that UNC gets to recruit to Chapel Hill and Elon has to recruit to a small community outside of Burlington. It is what it is and the PHI needs GDS in it for tons of reasons listed in above posts.
I’m a NW fan and have seen GDS teams beat my Vikings in many sports over the years. Not one time did I ever leave angry because of the disadvantages. I left angry that we lost (but not last year’s opening round game!) and made sure my son and daughter knew they lost because they were outplayed.
Congrats to Page girls and GDS boys. Another great PHI tournament, already looking forward to next year’s event.
this is funny- You make some good points. I did not know Elon can only recruit out of a small community outside of Burlington. Thats a new one on me. Someone please tell me the differences between GDS and schools like Oakhill? Looks like they both get good kids from other schools. I don’t know.
The Pizza Hut girls tournament was mediocre at best if people would really be honest.
carolina blue- my statement read “Elon recruits TO the town of Elon”, not from the town of Elon (hence the major disadvantage vs. recruiting TO the college town of Chapel Hill). Read carefully before stating things….
The differences in a private school vs. a boarding school are extreme when it comes to athletics. It is run in the same way a college is when everything is on campus. Again, it is what it is and there is a reason those schools (Christ School, Oak Hill, Brewster Academy, New Hampton Prep, Hargrave, etc..) are always tremendously talented teams. Kids want to go there and compete at the highest level possible from across the country. PJ left a very talented school in Dudley that has a lot of history. Hargrave was a place that he could focus more intently on basketball at the highest level and ensure his academics remained where they needed to be. I’m assuming kids come to GDS for this very reason. BUT, if these schools listed above are 10s, GDS is a 7. We can all get mad at GDS for being an attractive option for these public school kids or we can do our best to keep them at our school.
The major point of this PHI is being looked over. There were 8 teams from our area that are good basketball teams. 4 of them could have won on the men’s side on any given week. I was most impressed by Page, but NE, GDS and Smith are all very good teams.
I think one real problem was with the seedings this year.
Last year, Page and Northern were in the championship game with Page winning it.
Greensboro Day was beaten early
This year GDS gets a 1 seed and Page and Northern are 4 and 5. Whats up with that? It just makes it look like whoever sets the seeds is for GDS. This early in the season, they should go with how it ended last year to be fairer.
OK OK I give up !!!!!! CONGRATS to all the teams for a good PHI. GO Tarheels
Here is an idea that would make a lot of people happy and bring in a lot of money. Invite 8 public school teams (Page, Northern, Grimsley, Northwest, Northeast, Ragsdale, Smith, then choose from Eastern, Western, Dudley. Southern, Southeast, Southwest, HPC and HPA). Put these 8 in the same bracket and crown a public school champion. Invite 8 private schools (GDS, and High Point Christian, Wesleyan, etc etc). Put these in the same bracket and crown a private school champion. Then have the public school champion play the private school champion for the “Grand Championship”. The Little Four is the most prestigious tournament around with a lot of attendees. Logistics should not be an issue because the Coliseum was not used prior to noon. This would pump a lot of money into our community and schools.
GDS is not as good as everyone thinks. If you can go out and recruit the best public school players in this area and only squeak by these schools…something is terribly wrong.
Let’s keep it where we don’t start calling out the kids or their parents unless it is in a positive way…..All the game decisions and school decisions are tough and we don’t need to go beating up the families….Have to let the kids play and wish them the best….When you see these kids struggling it should make you hurt a bit, especially if you have followed their careers….You want to see them do well and they see you and they know you are watching…..We don’t need to start up any family or team fueds……
Question 1: Who recruits for the Day School. Before you answer, make sure you have your facts, do not guess.
Questiounty AD jobon 2. If you were a high school coach at a private school wouldn’t you want the best players you could get.
Question 3 GDS has no attendance zone, so where should they get their students?
Fact There must be something to private schools because a local coach sent his son to play for one
Fact The NCHSAA has so many stupid rules in olace that it really punishes the good coaches and players who want to get better.
Fact. If GCS would go to schools of choice it would be a lot better for everyone..
Opinion: GCS has no athletic leadership. You have AD’s who have been AD’s for years and got turned down for the County AD position. They hired someone with very little experience. GCS are weak in my opinion and if I had a child I would send him to a private school as well.
Fact: Dudley is an academy and they can get any player they want if he enrolls in the academy. Tell me theres no recruiting going on there.
Fact; Boards of Education use kids as numbers instead of individuals to have diversity. Send kids to the closest school to there house. This would save money
Fact. Saw in paper the other day where School Board voted to send kids from SW to Colfax and they were to catch the bus at 6:30 in the morning. I am
talking about 5,6,and 7 years olds catching the bus at dark. What leadership is this?
stop hating. it was a great tournament. Gds played great and so did NE.. if you hate them so much you go get a team and play them.
The tournament was a great event. Congratulations to all the participating teams and schools.
GDS – congratulations on tieing Dudley for the most championships. You all are definitely an asset to the tournament.
The definition of jealous – resentment against a rival, a person enjoying success.
People become jealous of other people’s success or team success in the case of GDS. We should all just be thankful that we have the Pizza Hut to enjoy and that individuals volunteer countless hours to allow all the proceeds to go back to the schools. GDS has experienced tremendous success in the Pizza Hut and so have the PAGE girls. GDS has an amazing program and school and we should all be thankful it’s in Guilford County. Winning 5 out of 7 tournaments is tough and a big accomplishment. PAGE girls winning their 11th title is a tremendous success too and we should be happy to have them representing Guilford County. Setting a tournament record is big for their program.
I would like to CONGRATULATE PAGE AND GDS ON WINNING THE PIZZA HUT INVITATIONAL!!!! I would also like to THANK ALL PLAYERS WHO PARTICIPATED even if your team didn’t win you went out and fought a great fight!!! To the people who posted ignorant comments—> At the end of the day its about the kids playing a sport that they LOVE and having the community come out and support them. Now sure everyone likes to win but that’s not the most important concept in basketball “THE TEAM” is. Until parents understand that there is more to basketball than just scoring lots of points and winning then that’s what the kids will continue to believe. As for recruiting no one is recruiting, if a parent switches a child’s school it’s not the school’s fault so why hold them accountable???? THIS IGNORANT MENTALITY SICKENS ME AND IN THE END IT WILL SUCK THE LOVE FOR THE GAME OUT OF YOUR KIDS BECAUSE IT GOES FROM THEM LOVING THE GAME TO EITHER YOU LIVING YOUR DREAM THROUGH THEM OR THEM JUST TRYING TO PLEASE YOU!!!
GOOD LUCK TO ALL GUILFORD COUNTY SCHOOL BASKETBALL TEAMS!!!!
“I’m just saying” said it perfectly. The kids should enjoy their sport and we should support them. It is their game, not ours.
Congratulations to both Page girls and GDS boys. Both teams are very well coached and their kids play hard. That is my observation from the three days of the tournament.