Chat with John Helsley at 11 a.m.
Edmond boys: Stars galore…
By Robert Przybylo
BPrzybylo@opubco.com
I’m already excited for next season for the Edmond boys’ basketball teams. There are a lot of reasons to be pumped if you’re an Antler, Bulldog, Husky or Wolf fan. I mean a lot.
Santa Fe
The question will be leadership. You just don’t replace leadership like Mahlon Jones and Drew Hall and not miss a beat.
But the talent is most definitely going to be there. It’s going to start with Josh Richardson, who is currently a three-star recruit on rivals.com.
Richardson won’t be alone. We saw glimpses of what Michael Onuoha can do, and he’ll only grow to be bigger and better. Phoenix Bills is quite the shooter and Aaron Anderson is going to be the guy I think will step up more than others think.
Memorial
Oh look out for Shane Cowherd’s boys. Almost all key components of a fun bunch are back. Obi Emegano is going to dominate the headlines (rightfully so) but Jared Jobe and James Woodard are just as vital to this team. When Jobe gets hot from the outside, ooh, is it fun.
And if Kameron Doolittle elects to continue to play basketball after all the football hoopla, he’s not bad there, either. I would peg Memorial as the best Edmond team as of right now.
North
A lot of youth, so it will be interesting to see what happens. Mike Menzel and Daniel Emesiani meant so much to this team in every way possible.
Excited to see the development of Cameron Haley and Tyler Sanders. North was in so many tight ones this season that might be a case of next year’s team learning to win those games.
Deer Creek
Coach Matt Bailey has brought a fire to this team. It’s a real electric atmosphere at Antler games. Replacing Hayden Wagner is going to be tough, but there are some strong pieces back.
The key is going to be finding a balance with Garrett Hermanski, Jalen Burnett and Jurrell Callaway. Those are the three that need to get theirs but need to find a way for all of them to contribute. So many times if one was on, the other was silent.
NCAA Tourney: LeBron or Kobe?
by Brandon Chatmon
bchatmon@opubco.com
I am helping out with the Oklahoman’s coverage of the NCAA Tournament at the Ford Center.
I asked several players who they prefer: LeBron or Kobe?
Wally Judge, Kansas State: “LeBron. I’m down for the younger guys.”
Steve Jones, UNLV: “Kobe. He’s proven it over the course of time, LeBron hasn’t proven it yet.”
Matt Shaw, UNLV: “LeBron. Even though I’m from LA. He does so much as a player. He can get a triple double anytime.”
Anthony James, Northern Iowa: “LeBron. Watching him in high school and he’s an better overall player. He can get a triple double.”
Curtis Kelly, Kansas State: “Kobe. LeBron is a better passer, a better athlete. But Kobe’s basketball I.Q. is better.”
PC West’s Neal named Gatorade POY
Putnam City West’s boys basketball season ended short of the gold ball the Patriots desired, but postseason acclaim is still coming their way.
PC West’s 6-foot-6 senior forward Tyler Neal was named the state’s Gatorade Player of the Year on Thursday.
Neal averaged 18.6 points and 8.3 rebounds in teaming with fellow standout Amric Fields to lead the Patriots to the Class 6A semifinals in their first state tournament appearance since 1977.
“We wish we would’ve gone a little further, but we had a good season,” Neal said Thursday while out of town for spring break. “This is a great honor, but it wasn’t just me. It took the whole team for us to be as successful as we were.”
While he remains undecided on his college future, Neal has received recruiting interest from Oklahoma coach Jeff Capel in recent weeks. He is keeping much of the recruiting process private, but has received offers from multiple NCAA Division I programs.
– Scott Wright, swright@opubco.com
Stevie Graham talent test
Oklahoma State went to the 2004 Final Four with five players who eventually made the NBA. Of those five, who figured that five years later the most productive pro would be the least heralded. Stevie Graham.
Graham scored 19 points Wednesday night to help the Charlotte Bobcats beat the Thunder 100-92, and Graham has become a solid member of Larry Brown’s rotation.
Stevie Graham has made eight starts, played in 57 games, averaged 4.3 points a game (he’s Charlotte’s defensive stopper) and has played 675 minutes.
Boston’s Tony Allen actually has played more minutes this season (735); he’s the Celtics’ defensive stopper, too. Joey Graham, Stevie’s twin brother, is now with the Denver Nuggets and has played 626 minutes.
The other two NBA players on Sutton’s 2004 roster — Ivan McFarlin and John Lucas — haven’t played in the league since 2007.
Stevie Graham often was in Sutton’s doghouse and was the sixth or seventh man most of his two-year career. If Sutton, who almost always drew the most out of ballplayers, had figured out how to capitalize on Stevie Graham’s talent, the Cowboys would have been even more of a powerhouse.
The 2004 Cowboys are a great example of the talent needed to have a superb season. You don’t need five NBA players, necessarily, to make a Final Four, but it doesn’t hurt. The current Cowboys, who by no means are Final Four contenders, have one clear NBA player, James Anderson. I suppose it’s possible, but unlikely, that someone else could develop, like Matt Pilgrim.
But the 2004 Cowboys show Travis Ford how far he needs to upgrade his talent to make OSU a national contender like it was periodically under Sutton.
A refreshing conversation with a New Mexico ski icon
Benny Abruzzo
SANTA FE, N.M. – It had been nearly 24 hours since I endured my worst-ever day skiing. Old injuries piled up, piled on and left me sidelined inside the Ski Santa Fe cafeteria.
What was supposed to be a week-long tour of some of New Mexico’s finest ski resorts was a bust for me. While fellow travel writers checked out Santa Fe’s slopes, I was nursing a bad back that left me hobbled a day after aggravating it on Angel Fire’s peaceful runs.
Bad skiing and nagging injuries don’t mix well. But even in such crummy circumstances, sometimes there’s a silver lining.
Benny Abruzzo ate breakfast with the group of journalists, myself included, that had come to check out Santa Fe. While one writer persisted (in annoying fashion) that I push through it, Abruzzo understood my pain. He’d been there. And so when everyone left, he hung out with me for 90 minutes.
What a treat that was.
Abruzzo runs Ski Santa Fe. He’s an avid skier. But talk to him long and you get a sense that he’s not just a skier-turned-businessman. Abruzzo is an outdoor enthusiast who has a refreshing passion for skiing, rock climbing and mountaineering.
“If you don’t do anything else, you have to get to Chamonix,” he told me as we discussed our shared love of the mountains.
Chamonix, if you don’t know, is basically the center of the mountaineering universe. The town in France is the jumping off spot for famous climbs up the Eiger and many other choice climbing destinations. Mountaineering was arguably invented and definitely perfected in Europe, with the Alps being the setting for the exploits of climbing’s pioneers.
Run into someone who talks about their experiences climbing in the Alps (and especially Chamonix), you’re bound to get an air of elitism reserved for those been-there, done-that alpinists who would scoff at my rather light climbing resume.
Not Abruzzo. It’s just a place he’s been where he’s done what he loves. We talked about peaks in Colorado, climbing spots in New Mexico’s Sandias and even a few places in Oklahoma. More than once, he mentioned how people from his home state, as well as Texas, hone their big wall skills in the peaks not far from his hometown of Albuquerque.
In each story he told, his love was more for the activity and the place, not his own accomplishments.
And it’s something he likes to share. His dream for the near term? Taking his son to the Alps for days of hut-to-hut travels and climbs up that range’s spectacular and challenging routes.
Eventually, Abruzzo had to go tend to his media guests. I had to tend to my back and the inevitable decision to cut my trip short, head home and nurse myself back to health.
But if nothing else, I carried home a little bit of encouragement. Climbing and mountaineering are full of big egos, ambition and narcissism that encourage an unhealthy form of hero worship. What we need are a few more people like Benny Abruzzo, people who are passionate about the outdoors and not themselves. These are the people who will pass on their craft to future generations who, if we’re lucky, will not just enjoy themselves in the backcountry , but also learn to appreciate it, take care of it and pass it along.
Bob Doucette
Berry Tramel’s NCAA Men’s Bracket
Click the image to view Berry’s men’s bracket.
How about one last Power Poll…
A reader asked me what the boys basketball Power Poll for the big schools (Class 6A-4A) would look like now, and it sounded like a fun idea, so here goes. But first some ground rules: All games are created equal. No bonus points for winning a state title. This is about which teams have the best talent and were playing the best at season’s end (not just the last weekend).
During the season, the Power Poll was about ranking the best teams, not about predicting the state champions. This poll is about ranking the best teams, not rewarding the state champions. They got a gold ball and they get to spend the next 12 months being called state champs. If that’s not reward enough, I’m afraid can’t help you here.
Let’s get to it:
1. Douglass, 4A: The Trojans are 30-0 and might be on their way to 60-0. They might not have gone undefeated against a schedule like Putnam City or Edmond Memorial played, but they’re good. Really good. And they’ll only get better. With all the tools they have, there’s no ceiling for this team next year.
2. Putnam City, 6A: In mid-February, the Pirates finally found themselves and started playing together, which made all the difference. They won their last 10 games, defeating the two teams that accounted for all four of their losses.
3. Midwest City, 6A: Nobody was playing better than the Bombers during the playoffs, but shots didn’t fall in the title game. The defense they play is as tough as anyone, and they have a good group of returning players for next season, including the Colbert twins.
4. Putnam City West, 6A: Over the course of a full season, I think PC West is a better team than Midwest City, because Tyler Neal and Amric Fields are good enough to have an off night and still beat most teams. That said, the Pats weren’t the same team after Neal’s second ankle injury. His outside shot never returned to form and things seemed out of sync for the whole team. And a head-to-head matchup with MWC is a disaster, because it the Bombers are too strong and athletic at guard, particularly with their trapping and defensive pressure.
5. Edmond Santa Fe, 6A: The Wolves might have peaked too early, or maybe they were a victim of their schedule, playing all their tough opponents at home first, then going on the road for those games late in the season. Their guard play was solid and they were good enough inside to mask the fact that they didn’t have a lot of size.
6. Tulsa Memorial, 5A: Like I said, all games created equal. The Chargers, with their athletic guards and 6-foot-9 Cameron Downing in the middle, were the best team in 5A, despite the finals loss to Tulsa Washington. They beat the Hornets three times before that, and beating someone four times in a season is darn tough, a fact PC West will agree with.
7. Edmond Memorial, 6A: This team lingered in the back half of the top 10 most of the season after a strong start, and they got the job done on the east side, reaching the state tournament, nearly knocking off the eventual runner-up, Midwest City, in the first round. The Bulldogs never really had those eye-catching wins, but they didn’t draw attention with bad losses either. They were just solid all year, and they only started one senior, so they’ll be back next year.
8. Tulsa East Central, 5A: What, another team that lost to Tulsa Washington ranked ahead of the Hornets? Yes, Washington had four losses in the final month of the season. Sure, they avenged two of those in the semifinals and finals, but over the course of the season, East Central was a better team. Damion Hooks was very impressive at state, despite the Cards losing in the semifinals.
Rounding out the top 15: Tusla Washington (5A), McGuinness (4A), Woodward (4A), Muskogee (6A), Norman North (6A), Star Spencer (4A), Western Heights (5A).
– Scott Wright, swright@opubco.com
Chat Recap: Berry Tramel
Hello, Milwaukee
I woke up in Milwaukee this morning, to 50something-degree weather. The It’s supposed to be a high in the 60s, which is pretty good for March 18. The Chamber of Commerce should make me an honorary citizen.
The single most beautiful day, weather-wise, that I’ve ever experienced came in Milwaukee. On Aug. 1, 1999, me and pal Owen Canfield and his boys woke up in Milwaukee, in an old hotel down off Lake Michigan, part of a baseball tour we made.
We went down to the lake and walked around, then made it over to County Stadium for a 1 p.m. Brewers-Expos game. At first pitch, it was 69 degrees, with a cool breeze. Sublime weather. We had brats with the special sauce, the crowd wasn’t huge, the old ballpark had that old-timey feel. What a day.
Milwaukee is a great old city. Strikes me as a mini-Chicago that is comfortable in its own shoes.
This is my third trip to Milwaukee. I was here in 1999 for the NCAA Tournament, but I went back and forth between here and Indianapolis, so I didn’t see as much of the city.
But it’s a good place for an NCAA regional. Great basketball tradition. The Bucks. The Marquette Warriors. Down the road in Madison, Bo Ryan has turned the Badgers into NCAA Tournament regulars.
Milwaukee was a memorable site for OU back in 1999. Kelvin Sampson got his first NCAA Tournament victory at the Bradley Center, with an upset of Arizona. Then the Sooners beat Charlotte to make the Sweet 16 in St. Louis.
Now OSU is in Milwaukee, with Georgia Tech and Ohio State in its way before a trip to the Sweet 16 in, yes, St. Louis.
That beer capital tour in 1999 got Sampson off the NCAA drought list. Travis Ford didn’t wait nearly as long for his first NCAA win — his Cowboys beat Tennessee last March — but another first-round victory would stamp OSU as an NCAA Tournament force, a program that is following the Eddie Sutton tradition of not being an easy out in March.
