Hazen Summer League 2018 preview: Players to watch
Right now the NBA Las Vegas Summer League is going on. Tonight one of North Dakota Class B’s Summer Leagues will have a tournament, which can give basketball fans some insights. Just like the NBA Summer League, there are some things to look for but not a whole picture.
Hazen’s Summer League tourney will feature Region 5 Teams (Flasher, New Salem, Garrison, and Washburn) and teams from Region 7 (Killdeer, Hazen, Beulah, Glen Ullin Hebron).
This tournament will be missing some key contributors because of summer baseball and AAU basketball. But it will give a snapshot of what to expect from some underclassmen, role players moving into starting spots and seeing which players are ready to adjust from JV and Frosh ball to the Varsity speed.
Hazen 2018 summer league bracket.Flasher is a team to watch. Brian Nieuwsma always gets his team to play hard and they are 6-0 in the summer league.
Killdeer is in rebuilding mode. They’ve gone 0-5 and will be without seniors last year. Their head coach, Andy Murphy, loves to build his teams into strong half-court defensive units. We’ll see where they are at in terms of understanding team defense.
Hazen is 4-2 in Summer League. Ben Nelson, Hazen’s head coach, has a state title under his belt and for the first time since he arrived at the school, they have experience in their line up. This is a sleeper team in Region 7 this year.
New Salem has struggled this year with a 2-4 mark in summer league. This tournament will be a chance to see if they can build some success. Garrison is also in the same boat at 1-4. We’ll get to see where they need to improve to reach .500 overall during the winter. Washburn is another building team at 1-6.
Glen Ullin-Hebron is another sleeper team in Region 7. There have been a lot of coach resignations in the region and they’re a team who will have a new head coach. But they’ve got some good athletes who can defend and some scorers.
Beulah is last year’s Region 7 champion but they have a big 3 to replace in Derek Ferebee, Logan Miller and Jacob Weigel. Chad Morsette is out of state playing in the Prep Hoops Senior Showcase and NABI. Beulah will also be missing some players because of a summer baseball tourney.
They’ve looked good in summer play at 5-1 overall. The tournament will start at 4 p.m. and is scheduled for a 9:20 championship game.