Offers, Updates, and Link-O-Rama! July 19, 2009.

I spoke with Chris Hawkins, the Spiece Indy *STARS* 2012 coach yesterday and he said Jeremy Hollowell has decided to stay with the Spiece Indy Stars through July. Hollowell has seen his game and his offer list grow rapidly this summer and appears to be one of the highest recruited kids in the 2012 class at this point if offers are used as a barometer. He has offers from Illinois, Tennessee, Ohio State, Indiana, Iowa, and others despite not even beginning his sophomore year.


New offers keep rolling in. According to Chicagohoops Jeff Johnson of the Peoria Irish has received offers from American University and SIU-Edwardsville. He has a nice mid range shot and plays physical at 6'8, when I saw him against Camp Daryl in Indianapolis he looked like a solid mid-major to me. http://www.chicagohoops.com/articles1/jeffjohnson2.html

A couple of nice features by the Indy Star's recruiting blog. Spiece Select 2011 teammates Kendall Griffin (scout.com photo mug-shot above) and Zach Van DeWater are both big guards with D1 attention and at least mid-major futures. I've seen the play a little although Griffin was out this spring and they are both really impressive players. Griffin is a versatile guard who can play some point or off the ball and has good length at at least 6'4. He has an offer from IPFW on the table and interest from several schools including Xavier, Purdue, Michigan, and Dayton.
http://blogs.indystar.com/recruitingcentral/2009/07/avons-kendall-g.html Here is an interview posted on P-Hoops.blogspot.com which is a wonderful site for position player rankings in Indiana from somebody who gets to see them quite a bit. http://p-hoops.blogspot.com/2009/01/one-on-one-with-kendall-griffin.html The interview is from January but has some information on Kendall's recruitment.

Van DeWater plays for Whitko and has interest from Butler, Ball State, and Indiana State among others. http://blogs.indystar.com/recruitingcentral/2009/07/vandewater-hear.html They have several D1 teammates to watch including 6'7 brute Tony Springmann who is also getting recruited at the highest levels as a tackle in football.

Albany has offered 6'2 shooting guard Blake Justice from Peebles, Ohio. He plays for CBIZ. HighMajorscoop is one of our favorite twitter links to follow during aau tournaments and they have some new content on their website including this link on Justice and some other Ohio recruiting buzz. http://highmajorscoop.com/2009/07/weekend-scoop/

Also according to the above link Bowling Green, Wright State, and James Madison have offered 2010 small forward Craig Seeley from Brookhaven, Ohio.

Back to the Indianapolis Star's Kyle Neddenreip with another blog entry, this time on the Mount Vernon trio the good Mongrel has blogged about a few times. Daniel Turner has offers from Wright State, Lipscomb, Navy, and UW-Green Bay. He's the 6'5 all hustle jack of all trades small forward. PJ Hubert is the big time shooter. He has an offer from IUPUI. DeAndre Davis is a 6'6 forward with offers from UW-Green Bay, IUPUI, and IUPFW.

The good Mongrel linked several updates of the NY2LA Summer Jam and should've updated some wrap up reports a couple of days ago but dropped the ball. Here are a few links talking up the performances of Cameron Wright, Vander Blue, Moses Morgan, Dominique Fergeson, Percy Gibson, Chasson Randle, Trey Zeigler, Branden Dawson, and several other players of interest. Here are the 17U standouts
http://www.ny2lasports.com/SummerJam17UTopPerformers.htm. And here are the 16U standouts
http://www.ny2lasports.com/SummerJam17UTopPerformers.htm. NY2LA had similar coverage of the NY2LA Invitational from the first week of July if you click on their home page the links are on the side. It didn't have as much talent as the Summer Slam but it had quite a bit of the same people.

Here is a similar rundown by ESPN Scouts.inc on the Triple S Mountain Slam last week. Western Kentucky commitment Derrick Gordon is mentioned along with Indiana target Tyrone Johnson and some updates on some mystery Canadians the good Mongrel was marvelling at in passing at the Kentucky Hoopfest. Kadeem Green was really impressive with his ability to handle the ball at 6'8 or so and the ability to drive consistently and shoot a pretty jumper. http://sports.espn.go.com/ncaa/recruiting/basketball/mens/news/story?id=4338300

Are you a little depressed about not having a budget to get to Vegas or Orlando to see hoops? The frugal Mongrel's hoops budget this month is going to be limited. I'll make a trip to Merrillville to see the End of Summer Classic put on by Chicagohoops and I'm also hoping to get a chance to peek in at the USSSA Championships put on in Fort Wayne about the same time. I'll be catching much of the Reebok Championship on the web for free on Wazoosports.com. It is the best quality you'll find and they have real Kentuckians doing the play by play so you get to hear the latest gossip on the kids playing the game as well as feel like you aren't drinking alone if you're sipping a little bourbon. The video is superior to what you find elsewhere and the games are pretty random. My other pursuit will be Grassrootstv.com. It is run in cahoots with Maxxathlete.com and hoopmasters.com and I am not sure how much of it will be free and how much will require a monthly subscription. I'll foot the bill for a month if I have to, but I think last year a lot of it was free. They are doing the Las Vegas Main Event from the 22nd to the 26th and the Double Pump Best of Summer Tournament from the 27th to the 31st. You can watch replays so it is wise for the married readers to wait till the kids are in bed and the wife turns on Trueblood before checking in there. I also hear Jody Demling will be doing a lot of live blogging from Vegas so get him with questions if he is watching something you're interested in.

7/14 Best of Midwest, Summer Jam, Peach Jam, Mntn Jam, any jam...

Kyle Neddenreip update from Indy Star from Best of Midwest Tournament with updates on Spiece Indy Stars 2012 last second Ron Patterson 3 pointer to beat 16U Team JSA as well as a Crishawn Hopkins update and Zac Van DeWater, Willie Rhodes, and more... http://blogs.indystar.com/recruitingcentral/2009/07/tuesday-update.html I've been out on the trail a lot this summer and seen Kyle's face a lot. Indystar seems serious about getting into recruiting coverage and Kyle is the man on point.

Another great update from Hoosier Hills Hoops on Monday's Best of Midwest action with updates on ... http://www.hoosierhillshoops.com/2009/07/14/best-of-the-midwest-monday-notebook/

And the 4-0 Kentucky Gators are on a roll at the Best of the Midwest tournament according to the Louisville High School Examiner. He mentions the good play from Orlando Rutledge, Chris Richard, and Tim Henderson who is being watched by Northwestern. They will play Spiece Select tomorow at 10:15. Bloomington South import TJ Bell will be playing at 10:15 for his Indiana Elite South squad. Griffin McKenzie, Kennis White, Donnie Hale, Travis Carrol, and Crishawn Hopkins get some mention in the Indystar update...
http://blogs.indystar.com/recruitingcentral/2009/07/wednesdays-sche.html

NBE blog has worked so hard and done so much great coverage of the Peach Jam and a couple of now finished tournaments that it wore me out trying to keep up with the work they did. Its like telling the bank to stop accepting anonymous deposits in your checking account. Here is their Peach Jam update with top 5 scorers from pool play (Barnes on top), top 5 rebounders (Sullinger) and updated the semi-finals which pits All Ohio Red against City Rocks in one match and Team Final against Team Florida in the other. http://w3.nbebasketball.com/2009/07/14/nbe-live-at-peach-jam-tuesday-updated-940-am/

Day 3 of the Summer Jam is in the books. I'm still waiting on a couple of reports to add but the resutls are in and some great matchups will be featured tomorow. SYF Players (Branden Dawson, Mitch McGary, Marcus Crider) will match up against DTA Devin Harris 16U team and it will be a nice battle to make it to the semi-finals against the winner of Illinois Wolverines vs Illinois Old School. The 17U division has some key matcups as well. Dominique Fergeson and Jesse Berry will lead the 17U SYF Players against the DTA Devin Harris All-Stars. The winner would fave the winner of the Wisconsin Scholars (Flavien Davis and Dakotah Euton) vs Team Detroit which just survived a close match against the ICAN All-Stars (Moses Morgan). The other side of the bracket features King James All-Stars (Cameron Wright) vs Net Gain Sports and the Illinois Kings against 43 Hoops.

Mountain State Jam Fest is underway and Shining Star McFarland was 2-0 on first day with victories against Sam Rines and Dejuan Wagner Rising Stars. Miami commitment Josh Sewell and Austin Flannery led the way in both games and they are matched up against the New Jersey Roadrunners in a dynamite matchup. I love Chad Jackson and Josh Sewell as underrated kids but Kyrie Irving is a bit over their heads. The Shining Stars are much bigger with Washington and company so a slow pace might benefit them. http://shiningstarsports.blogspot.com/2009/07/triple-s-west-virginia-jam-fest-update.html Irving is a top target for Indiana, Notre Dame, and Kentucky.

Twitter Tuesday Summer League Tracker

Bittersweet technology simultaneously confounds and tempts the simple Mongrel and nowhere is the landscape quite so vague, yet rewarding as the Twitter fields. Twittatory can be confusing and often searches turn up more than one fish the Mongrel wishes he could throw back. But some good ball is being played, and gettin twitty wit' it is the only way the good Mongrel can come to terms.

GoldandBlack.com has a twitter page the Mongrel has been following for a while now. Purdue has hosted five team camps and several juicy droplets of update mana have flowed from their free twitter page http://twitter.com/GoldandBlackcom. Several links reveal even more detail, but the team camps at Purdue this June have included Whitko winning the small school tournament behind star junior Zach Van DeWater and coach's son Logan Irwin. Irwin is a 5'9 sophomore to be and is one of Indiana's top scoring returning sophomores. Van DeWater is a 6'5 athletic kid with good driving ability and quickness. Indianapolis Pike won Purdue's most recent team camp behind a strong effort from Khristian Smith who has an offer from IUPUI and strong interest other D1 schools including Brad Brownell's Wright State program and Chris Lowery's Southern Illinois machine. Recent Purdue 2010 commitment Donnie Hale from New Albany was up and down, but had a good game against elite 2011 forward Branden Dawson. Dawson is one of the best athletes in the class and has a little bit of a jump shot but will need to keep developing some wing skills or grow into power forward to keep his lofty position in the class of 2011. His upside is unlimited and he simply outclasses good athletes because he's on another level. Rock Island, Illinois star Chason Randle just made it back from the USA 16U team playing somewhere down where snakes get 50 feet long and they make gas out of sugar in time for some good performances as well.

Forgive the Mongrel some map-bending, but excellent and frequent updates of the (deep breath) Hoop Group Metro Summer Showcase provided by NorthStarBball at http://twitter.com/NorthstarBball deserves a special mention. Kids today. Tisk, tisk, tisk. Ok, now that the authoritative Mongrel has spoken he feels better. Several national level stars who are being recruited by Ohio State, Indiana, Kentucky, Marquette, Louisville, and several other areas closer to the Mongrel's lair participated. This year a brawl broke out between Patterson Catholic and Neumann-Garetti in the semi-final. The Hoops Gods are throwing some moving screens and leading with their elbows this morning after being robbed of a showdown between Patterson Catholic and Saint Benedicts. The aging Mongrel has been kicking around thoughts of spinning a yarn for the blog on the fights which have become an epidemic at Chicago Public League games between players in some cases and fans in other cases. Last year games were cancelled, spectators killed, and some games games were played with no spectators at all. Come on fellas, this is a game. If the other guy is better than you or a little meaner than you, you don't get to win by fighting. In fact it kind of makes you look like a wuss when you can't handle getting slapped around a little by somebody who is better or is willing to work a little harder, you gotta prove it the right way boys. Hoops is hoops, non-hoops is non-hoops. The worried Mongrel will keep a close eye on how CPL officials address this problem, but it is not limited to Chicago unfortunately.

OK, this section is where the tricky Mongrel will confuse you with alliteration aplenty and some words that just sort of sound a little funny which might tell similar stories. Bark bark no shell games please. An outstanding blog the Mongrel peruses from time to time is now twitting away. Hoosier Hills Hoops can be found at http://twitter.com/hoosierhills. They reported that defending 4A Indiana state champion Bloomington South crushed New Albany who ended the season #2 in the state in the same class before the tournament. The score was 94-34, but it was the USSFA runner up game. Bloomington South finished the season undefeated last year but lost Indiana Mr Basketball Jordan Hulls. Butler University 2010 commitment Eric Fromm, Xavier University 2011 commitment Dee Davis, and high major 2011 prospect Spencer Turner return along with newcomers first team All-State (AZ) and 2011 Indiana University commitment Matt Carlino and 2012 Illinois import TJ Bell. Turner was fresh back from the Michigan elite camp and the keen Mongrel believes he has gotten in much better shape than he was last summer. The USSFA championship was won by Mount Vernon, which has benefited from the play of a trio of 2010 stars that Hoosier Hoops Report (different from Hoosier Hills Report, see the tricky Mongrel wasn't pulling your leg) says look to be mid majors. Hoosier Hoops Report's twitter page is http://twitter.com/HHReport and they provided some excellent coverage of the event including 3A Mount Vernon's double digit wins over 4A favorites Bloomington South and Carmel. PJ Hubert was lighting it up behind the arch again and Daniel Turner and DeArmond Davis had big tournaments as well. The good Mongrel has been fond of Daniel Turner's game for a while and is looking forward to seeing the trio play this year. Turner is a scrappy fighter and plays strong and is a pretty good athlete at 6'5.

The good Mongrel retreated from the Twitter fronteir to the blogsphere which his mind has finally embraced, and the relieved Mongrel spent some time just looking at some web sites for some other summer league and team camp news. As always, Chicago Hoops and their e-rival Illinois Prep Bullseye both present a wealth of good free information, not to mention Chicago Hoops' premium content. This time we'll site the good work of the Bullseye http://ilprepbullseye.com/page50.html which reported that at the satellite University of Illinois team camp Foreman HS teammates 2010 LeVonte Dority and 2010 Mike McCall were outstanding once again. McCall has recently returned from the Texas AM elite camp and Dority returned from Indiana University's elite camp and both appear to be on a roll this summer. The good Mongrel loves his Chicago point guards. Dority seems to get a bit more national buzz than McCall but the Chicago media seem to see it the other way.

10 Most Underrated Kids in Indiana

10 best D1 prospects in Indiana who the deep digging Mongrel has not seen on a top 100 list, its getting hard because old secrets like Dee Davis, Jeremy Hollowell, Ron Patterson, are gettin out and showing up already.

1) Jesse Berry 2010
2) Tony Springmann 2011
3) Austin Burgett 2012
4) Zach Van DeWater 2011
5) Edward Seay 2012
6) Gary Harris 2012
7) Justin Gant 2011
8) Kendall Griffin 2011
9) Jake Kitchell 2010
10) Xavier Jones 2010

Indiana is so deep in talent in the 2011 and 2012 classes the overwhelmed Mongrel figures there are at least a dozen kids who'll show up on top 100 lists in those classes that have yet to prove themselves to the right people, it'll be a constant update/edit task because the Hoosier state is well scouted and wonderful web sites (many are linked at the bottom of the Mongrel's home page) like Hoosier Hoops Report and the Indiana and Purdue rivals sites as well as Indiana's Scout site do spectacular jobs of covering local talent. * Edit one 6/30/09 my #1 on the list was Cody Zeller and he showed up #57 on Scout.com's top 75 list for 2011. Austin Etherington was on the list too removing him from future consideration of our 10 Snubbed Hoosiers.

There are more AAU programs in Indiana than stars in the sky and the school coaches there entertain in front of the biggest crowds in the country. The nomadic Mongrel has roots all around, but nowhere is basketball so beloved and so organized and efficient as you see in the Hoosier state. Kentucky is a good comparison but its more a religion in Kentucky and an probably more of an art in the Hoosier state. The well traveled Mongrel grew up in Rex Chapman country and had a lot of years in Damon Bailey country as well. Hoosiers love their hoops and the maters are pret near heavenly right time of year in Indiana too. And there's good basketball year round. The conflicted Mongrel included Seay and Harris in 2012 going blind for now but the wisest owls in the barn consistently say they are big time so the Mongrel is going to err on the side of caution for now.