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Southern Jam Fest Notebook (May 18-20)

05/21/2018, 2:30am EDT
By Josh Verlin

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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HAMPTON, Va. — The Hoop Group’s Southern Jam Fest invaded the Boo Williams Sportsplex over the course of three days, the field stocked with shoe company-sponsored teams for one of the highest-level non-live period events around.

Here’s a notebook from the weekend, featuring a number of local programs that made the trek down:

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Isaiah Wong (above) and WeR1 captured the Southern Jam Fest 17U championship on Sunday. (Photo: Josh Verlin/CoBL)

Wong, WeR1 capture crown in all-local finale

Teams came to Boo Williams from up and down the East Coast, with a heavy concentration in the Mid-Atlantic: Maryland, D.C., Virginia and North Carolina-based programs dominated the brackets, with the host Boo Williams EYBL program, a Nike-backed squad, among a group that also included Adidas-sponsored Team Loaded (N.C.), Under Armour squads New Heights (N.Y.) and D.C. Premier, and more.

But at the end, it came down to a pair of Philly-area programs for the title, as WeR1 and Philly Pride took care of business on their respective sides of the bracket to earn a spot in Sunday afternoon’s finale. And the two UA Association teams put on a show worthy of the final, trading the lead back-and-forth over the opening 25 minutes before WeR1 surged ahead late for a 61-54 win.

“It feels good, to come out with the championship this week,” Bonner-Prendergast (Pa.) junior and WeR1’s Isaiah Wong said. “Just playing all the EYBL and Adidas teams and just proving that Under Armour is still one of the (best).”

Wong certainly proved his spot amongst the better guards in the 2019 class, as the tournament MVP popped in 25 points in the final to cap off a stellar weekend for the 6-foot-3 scoring guard.

He hit the back-breaking 3-pointer, a corner shot off a feed from Justin Paz (2019/Bethlehem Catholic) after an offensive rebound by Paz, which pushed the lead to 58-50 with under three minutes remaining.

Villanova commit Eric Dixon (2019/Abington) chipped in 10 points for WeR1, which also got a strong effort from wing Chereef Knox (2019/Imhotep Charter), who shot the ball well from 3-point range all weekend.

Another Imhotep product, Donta Scott, had 15 points for Philly Pride, which got 13 from Trenton’s Reggie James and 11 from Roman Catholic’s Hakim Hart.

A Delco transplant who played his first two seasons of high school at Notre Dame (N.J.), Wong’s college recruitment is presenting several options for him to stay local. Villanova and Temple are two of four schools he said were on him hardest, along with Miami (Fl.) and UConn.

Though he plays alongside of Villanova’s two 2019 commitments in Dixon, a 6-7 power forward, Wong said that Dixon doesn’t spend too much time recruiting him.

“Not really, but we said it’s going to be a good place for him,” Wong said, but Villanova doesn’t need too much extra help after winning two of the last three national championships.

“They’re so competitive, they play against the big teams and always find a way to win,” Wong added. “It’s competitive.”

For now, Wong said he has no visits planned in June, and is open to seeing who else joins his recruitment after the July live periods. In terms of his decision, he said he’s looking for “(my) having a big role on a team, where I could flourish through the game after college, and just people around me that are friendly.”

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Bishop starting to figure out his recruitment

Standing and muscular-yet-slender 6-foot-4 with long arms, coming out of one of the top high school programs around and possessing the ability to score the basketball from all three levels, it’s no surprise that Dahmir Bishop is hearing from all sorts of high-level colleges as he enters the stretch drive of his recruitment.

After a strong April with K-Low Elite on the Adidas Gauntlet circuit, the Imhotep Charter rising senior picked up offers from Cincinnati, Providence, Rhode Island, Kansas State and South Florida, adding to a list that already included Penn State, Temple, La Salle, VCU and more.

Now, he’s starting to figure out just which ones are rising to the top of the list.

“I’m really just going off who I know loves me the most and who talks to me the most,” he told CoBL on Sunday after K-Low Elite was knocked out in the 17U quarterfinals by D.C. Premier.

“VCU’s been showing a lot of love, Penn State has been showing a lot of love,” Bishop added. “Rhode Island has really been on me, I talk to Coach Cox a lot, so he’s been on me. I’ve been talking to Aaron McKie from Temple a lot. I’ve been talking to a lot of coaches, I think I’m playing really well right now, so a lot of coaches are noticing how big I can play and keeping in contact with me.”

While the offers began to pile up for Bishop during his 16U summer last year, he wasn’t really focused at that time on exactly what it all meant. But this summer is rather different -- he’s paying attention to who’s courtside, to who’s reaching out, to who’s really interested.

“I’ve been talking to Kansas State, they’ve been at every game during the [April] live period. So I’ll see them a lot, (assistant coach Chester) Frazier from Kansas State a lot. I saw Coach Cox, he’s been at every game during the live period too. I have a real good relationship with Coach Cox.”

It’s no coincidence that Rhode Island has been hard in its pursuit of Bishop. Rams’ rising sophomore Daron ‘Fatts’ Russell, who averaged 7.0 ppg as a freshman this past season, is a fellow Imhotep Charter grad.

Bishop admitted Russell’s presence on the URI roster gives the Atlantic 10 program a bit of a boost: “Of course it does. Especially a guy like Daron, that’s a real good friend of mine. So that gives them a very good chance.”

An unofficial visit to URI’s campus is planned for June, but that’s the only current visit on Bishop’s calendar. He’s already been to Penn State, VCU and the local schools -- Temple, La Salle and St. Joe’s -- and also said he wants to visit Texas, where coach Shaka Smart has been showing recent interest.

And of course there’s still three more five-day live periods in July, where he’ll get the opportunity to reel in a few more looks before going through the official visit process in the fall.

“I think July is just going to be about seeing how my relationship with everyone is and then deciding from there,” Bishop said. “If I get more [offers] in July then I get more and I’ll still consider it, but I’m just focused on relationships that I have with guys right now.”

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Brickus bursting out nationally this spring

Over his first two years at Coatesville High School, Jhamir “Jig” Brickus has proven himself as not just one of the best young guards in the Philadelphia area, but one of the best lead guards, period.

Thanks now to a terrific April on the Under Armour circuit, he’s proving that he deserves in that consideration in perhaps a larger radius.

Through the first two sessions of the Under Armour Association, Brickus is averaging 14.3 ppg and 4.5 apg, the latter of which is fourth-best amongst all players on the UAA 16U circuit. He’s hitting 56 percent of his shots, 47 percent of his 3-pointers and 80 percent of his foul shots, while also chipping in 3.8 rpg despite typically being the shortest player on the court.

“April was good, I got a little name for myself,” the 5-foot-10, 180-pound guard said. “It was very important to make a name for myself, get my name out there and hopefully get looks off that.”

Brickus continued his elevated level of play at Boo Williams, where he helped WeR1’s 16U group into the quarterfinal round. A strong-bodied guard with above-average athleticism, he’s terrific with the ball in his hands and can score from all three levels, though he’s clearly shown this spring that he can play the ‘1’ at a high level.

As a rising junior, Brickus is unable to personally hear from colleges until June 15, the first day that coaches can directly contact members of the 2020 class; he said he knew only that VCU had shown some interest thus far. But his AAU coach, WeR1 director Terrell Myers, said that he’s been hearing from “several local schools” already, and expects that attention to pick up in July.

“I think he’s starting to believe [how good he is], I think he’s starting to believe,” Myers said. “He’s really confident, but at the moment he’s just enjoying playing, which is fun. He just enjoys playing the game and every game he’s getting better and better.”

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Spencer Cochran (above) showed off his well-rounded offensive game to help power the East Coast Power 16s. (Photo: Josh Verlin/CoBL)

Malvern Prep’s Cochran showing versatility this summer

The Spencer Cochran who took the court with East Coast Power’s 16U squad this weekend looked quite different from the one who finished up his sophomore season at Malvern Prep just a few months ago.

At Malvern, Cochran has served primarily as a 3-point specialist in the Friars’ up-tempo, guard-heavy, shot-heavy attack, averaging 9.2 ppg in 2017-18. Though he only scored in double figures in one Inter-Ac game, it was the final one of the season, where he went for 16 points before scoring 11 in both of Malvern’s state playoff games.

“I hit a cold spell in the middle of the season and I didn’t do as well as I’d hoped,” he said. “But [I] kept working, finished off the year strong.”

That confidence has carried right over into the spring, where he’s helped his AAU squad to a few solid finishes at major tournaments. That continued this weekend, as ECPower’s 16s pulled off a surprising upset of Team Loaded (N.C.) in the second round and advanced all the way into Sunday’s quarterfinals, one of only a few non-shoe-sponsored teams to survive the first two days of action.

One of several guards who handled point guard duties for Power over the course of the weekend, Cochran showed he was much more than just a 3-point shooter, with some impressive drive-and-dishes, as well as finishes through contact. He also constantly showed off great court vision with a number of touch passes, barely letting the ball get to his hands before it was flying off towards an open teammate.

“I’ve always been able to see the floor well and my role on my varsity team’s more of a spot-up shooter,” he said, “but when I play with these guys, I play the role of the point guard and spread the ball around.”

Though he might look like one of Malvern Prep’s numerous multi-sport athletes, with a stocky 5-10, 180-pound frame, Cochran is purely a basketball player since giving up football and lacrosse after middle school.

But it makes sense, considering he grew up in a state that absolutely loves hoops -- Zionsville, Indiana, located about 15 minutes north of Indianapolis. There, the son of two Purdue grads grew up a huge Boilermakers fan, while also idolizing former Pacers great Reggie Miller.

He moved to the Philadelphia area in seventh grade, enrolling at Malvern for the first time in high school.

“Basketball’s everything in Indiana,” he said. “Same (as) here, you just play, compete -- everything is basketball, really.”

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Quick Hits

-- Philly Pride 17U made its run to the championship game on the backs of strong performances by two of its stars. Imhotep’s Donta Scott was likely in the frontrunner seat for MVP had Pride pulled out the championship game, but it was Hakim Hart that had perhaps the eye-opening performance of the tournament. Hart knocked down no fewer than three triples in every game over the weekend, including seven 3-pointers in the semifinal win Sunday morning.

Hart made his mark at Kingsway (N.J.) in his first two years of high school basketball, where the then 6-2 guard was one of South Jersey’s best 3-point shooters and its leading overall scorer (26.1 ppg). But he made the move to Roman Catholic (Pa.) for his junior year, and capped off a season where he averaged 15.1 ppg with (in order) 24, 25 and 26-point outings in the quarterfinals, semifinals and championship games of the PIAA 6A bracket.

But now up to over 6-5 and approaching 6-6, Hart’s stock is rising quickly. Temple and Tulane make two AAC programs who have offered Hart, though he’s still being chased by the likes of L La Salle, Robert Morris and Quinnipiac as well.

— The East Coast Power 16U win over Team Loaded NC was the beginning of what became a rather special few hours for the King of Prussia-based program, which then saw its 17s knock out the Loaded 17s a set later, 58-53, in a second-round game in that bracket. Team Loaded, typically one of the stronger AAU programs not just in the region but across the country, featured 2020 forward Isaiah Todd, a 5-star prospect, as well as numerous other high-level Division I targets. But terrific efforts from Episcopal Academy’s Matt Dade and Pennridge’s Sean Yoder, complemented by timely shot-making by the likes of David Duda Jr. (Methacton), Anthony DiCaro (Cherokee, N.J.) and Michael Peretta (Bonner-Prendergast), helped Power’s 17U group also reach the quarterfinals, where they bowed out to eventual champs WeR1.


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