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ABCD report Curry, Brown getting hounded; Sleepers emerge
Posted: Monday July 10, 2000 06:05 PM
TEANECK, N.J. -- After the first day of competition here at adidas ABCD camp, some people said the big story was how Eddy Curry and Kwame Brown aren't putting up big numbers, but I'd have been stunned if they had. Never have the big guys put up big numbers here because it's a wide-open, transition game, and they have trouble getting the ball. Curry and Brown are two of the top five talents in class, and I haven't seen anything yet to change my mind. Brown (Brunswick, Ga., No. 5 nationally in our summer rankings), who has committed to Florida, played pretty crummy Friday. He's frustrated because he's the big guy on his team, but he doesn't want to play center. Even though he's 6-foot-11, he plays closer to a small forward. So we know he can play better. The 6-11 Curry (Thornwood, Ill., No. 2) can also play better, but the problem was he wasn't getting the ball. They were triple-teaming him! Curry may not be the tallest player at camp, but he's definitely the strongest. He's like a man among boys. If he doesn't go directly to NBA next year and become a lottery player, I'd be totally stunned. You could make the argument -- and I wouldn't disagree with you -- that the best player here is Kevin Torbert (Flint, Mich., 4). Among wing players, Torbert and Julius Hodge (Bronx, N.Y., 19) have played the best. Torbert hadn't played in a couple weeks and thought he might be rusty, but he wasn't. He has tremendous shooting form -- he hangs on jump shot the way Michael Jordan used to. Since he's from Flint, there's been speculation that he's a lock for Michigan State, but he strongly denies that. In fact, the day before yesterday, he took an unofficial visit to UConn. He says he's very interested in the Huskies, and he's friends with their incoming juco transfer Johnnie Selvie. Cincinnati is in the picture too, as is Syracuse. Hodge, on the other hand, is built entirely different. He plays like a point guard, but he's tall enough (6-4) that, in a punch, you can play him at small forward. He's a scoring machine. He's got a top five list of schools, UNC, Syracuse, Florida, Maryland and N.C. State, and, a lot of people think, in that order. A guy I thought was really good Friday night was Julian Sensley, a fifth-year prep player at St. Thomas Moore (Conn.). He's one of the better players here. He verbally committed a year ago to California. We may have him too low at No. 17 in the class. The best wing-forward talent in the class is James White, (York, Pa., 6), though his team got whipped Friday night. He didn't play that badly. It's been assumed UNC and Duke would battle it out over White, but Duke has declined to offer him a scholarship. Also, his father said here that with Roy Williams turning down the UNC job, they may try to schedule an unofficial visit to Kansas! But he said they know whomever Carolina names will be a good coach, so that isn't really a concern. Greg Tinch (Albany, Ga., 35) had not played very well when we saw him at the Tournament of Champions in May, even though his Atlanta Celtics AAU team won that tournament. But in this kind of setting, where the game is up and down the court, he excels. At one point, his team threw an ally-oop to him out of line, but he jumped up with his back to the basket, caught the ball, leaned his neck back and flipped it with two hands behind him into the basket. He's still not the greatest jump shooter in world, but because he's a tremendous athlete, he's being watched by the likes of Kentucky, Duke, and North Carolina (that doesn't mean they've offered). He visited Seton Hall while here this week. As a point of comparison, he's ahead of where Chris Carrawell was at this stage in his career. Another wing player who's looked good is Quemont Greer (63), 6-6 from Milwaukee. In the transition game, he's a very athletic player. He played very well Friday night and rattled the basket a few times after slams. Hometown Marquette and Wisconsin are right there, but he's also heard from Michigan, Auburn, Iowa and Nebraska, among others. Among the point guards, T.J. Ford (Sugar Land, Texas, 15) is one of top three-ranked here, along with Maurice Williams (16) of Alabama and Jonathan Hargett (Durham, N.C., 11). Hargett didn't play too well Friday; T.J. Ford did. And Williams matched up with Ford in one Friday afternoon session. Some called it a standoff, but I guarantee you, Ford didn't get the worst of it. He was pilfering the ball over the court -- he must have had four or five steals, each time converting them into layups. His stock rose playing against the top guys. Ford lists Texas, Georgetown, Kentucky, Houston, Arizona and Auburn, but there's a rumor here that Kentucky could get commitments very soon from both Ford and teammate Daniel Ewing.
Chris Hernandez, (70) from Fresno, Calif., is a 6-2 point guard who's already committed to Stanford. He's another kid who makes good decisions all the time, and he hurts you if you make any mistakes at all. He's gonna jump higher on our list as well. Scouting the sleepersNow let's look at some of the guys who have not necessarily come out of nowhere, but certainly enhanced their statusRob Little is a 6-10, 270-pound guy from Fairfax, Va. He's been a horse inside, and a much more effective player than I've seen the last couple years. He's had a lot of schools involved with him, and we can see why. He's interested in Virginia, and people who've shown interest him this spring include Kentucky, Tennessee, Rhode Island, Georgia Tech, Seton Hall, N.C. State, Boston College and Virginia Tech. We had not seen play Chris Jackson, from Los Alamos, N.M., play before. He's not a great player, but he's 7-feet tall and he knows he's 7-feet tall. He's not the most athletic guy in the world, but he does run awfully well. You can understand why he's got Stanford, UCLA, Iowa and other major programs from around the country interested in him. Among the power forwards, there's Chuck Hayes, (88) from Modesto, Calif., listed as 6-6 but probably at least 6-7. He played very well at the NBA Players Association Camp last week so he did come in with some reputation. He's a versatile player, a big, strong guy, and he's gone out and surprised us by hitting some three-pointers. The list of schools who are watching him: UCLA, Kentucky, Kansas, Syracuse, Stanford and Cincinnati. I also like a kid from Dothan, Ala., Marco Killingsworth (100). He's a lefty, 6-8 power forward, a very athletic player, and not a bad jump shooter either. He's tough to match up with, and he's fared well here. From seeing him at the Tournament of Champions, we put him at the bottom of Top 100, but now he'll move up some from that. The list we have for him includes Cincinnati, Clemson, LSU, Miami (Fla.), Alabama, Auburn and Tennessee. Among wing forwards, there are two who have been surprises. T.J. Waldon (Lakeland, Fla.), whose brother B.B. plays at South Florida, is 6-5 but plays very tall. Get him out in the open court and he's a high-flyer, and he also has a pretty good jump shot. His brother's school is obviously in the mix, but he also likes Tennessee, Cincinnati, Alabama, Florida and Miami (Fla.). The other wing forward is Jackie Manuel (West Plam Beach, Fla.) He's about 6-5, and wing forward is his best position. He got criticized some -- people said he was overrated, and he didn't have the greatest spring, but he sure looked good here Friday. Defensively, he was about as effective as anybody. He stole passes and ran the court. He's expressed interest in Miami (Fla.), Syracuse, Texas, Duke and others. There are a lot of wing guards out there, but the first night, when they did a little scrimmaging, we noticed Dommanic Ingerson, (65) from Santa Barbara, Calif., might have been the most impressive player knocking down threes. He's close to 6-4. He can shoot and he can put it on the floor. We already had him among the top 65, but he'll go beyond that. His list includes Arizona, Kansas, California, UCLA, USC, Utah, Arizona State and St. Louis. From our standpoint, the one who totally came out of nowhere was John Blackgrove, 6-2 from New Jersey. He's a really good three-point shooter and one of those feisty players who gets a lot more done than you'd expect at first glance. A point guard who I'd say the same thing about is James Johnson, 6-foot from Mequan, Wis. He's not the greatest athlete in world, but he's turnover-proof. And if you back off him, he can hit the three-pointer. But mostly he's a set-'em-up playmaker. All the coaches will love the way he plays. Two other point guards who have played very well are Tony Bethel, 6-2 from Ft. Washington, Md., and Joe See, 6-0 from Concord, Calif.
Bethel is a good ball-handler, but an excellent three-point shooter. If you back off him, he makes you pay the price. He likes Georgetown, Pitt, Tennessee, B.C., Virginia and others. See is someone who did have some reputation after a good junior year. He's another one of those guys who is an effective player, but not the flashiest guy in world. He does what a point guard should. Schools in touch with him early included Utah, Santa Clara, Pepperdine, Loyola Marymount and SMU, but his own list includes Stanford, USC, Notre Dame, Oregon, Oregon State, Cal, Kansas State and Vanderbilt.
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