Summertime basketball has really exploded in the RCN viewing area over recent years, with rules expanding to make it more “coach friendly” (most of the time) and to increase the exposure of young athletes in both the Washington and Eastern Pennsylvania regions.
Some of the best teams in the country come into the Lehigh Valley, Philadelphia and the DMV area, and many players in these areas get to showcase their talents. As we’ve seen over the last few years, players (Victor Oladipo, Darrun Hilliard, and others) pave ways for themselves that could lead to one day playing in the NBA.
Over the next couple weeks we’ll take a look at some of the tournament action in the RCN viewing area, along with news on the players and teams that we cover on ‘RCN SportsTalk.’
Goodman Basketball
In the DMV region, Goodman Basketball has been a long-standing tradition that was in danger of dying out a few years ago, but has come back with a vengeance and bigger than ever before. A number of talented athletes each year both participate (and later return for) this event each summer.
Here’s a video detailing more of this year’s event and the history of the Goodman tourney…
Bonner Prendergast
The team looked very solid with double-digit wins over Phillipsburg and Berks Catholic recently, while playing without its best player. Lane Christian and Mike Perralta were key players in several games this past weekend, but they have a very well balanced team and could be a player in this winter’s district playoffs.
Bonner Prendergast was one of just eight teams this weekend at Cedar Beach (Allentown) that made it to the final day of the tournament with an undefeated record.
Lincoln Leadership
This summer was actually my first chance to see this team in person—and they did not disappoint. Although they did not make it to the later rounds of some of the Lehigh Valley’s tournament so far (they have been one of the smallest schools in the summer leagues), they have a nice team with good numbers and played very scrappy basketball each time I saw them.
Liberty
Last year around this time I remarked how impressed I was with gritty Hurricane players like Cam Hoffman, Alex Serrano and company. They had an impressive showing in their games this past weekend, making it through to the morning of the final day without suffering a loss. With several weeks remaining in different summer leagues and tournaments, Liberty should be a fun team to watch the rest of the summer, not to mention be fierce competition for Allen and Parkland for top spots in the EPC this winter.
Nazareth
While Nazareth will be going through a retooling effort—at least this summer—after losing so many key parts of their team, an under-the-radar player to keep an eye on might be Mayo Raman. In a game versus Saucon Valley he came up big in pressure situations—scoring 12 points in the second half of that game and hitting a clutch “3” to send the game to overtime.
We’ll have more high school summer basketball talk and insights on this Thursday’s “RCN SportsTalk” program (live, 7pm on RCN-TV) and next week here at the “SportsTalk Shop.”
