The Race for Mr. Basketball
How have the Mr. Basketball Candidates began their seasons? NHR breaks it down now!
The Leader. Matthew Hurt. Five Star Standout Matthew Hurt and his JM Rockets kick off the season tonight night at home against Mankato East. Hurt is currently the 16th leading scorer in the history of Minnesota high school basketball and is very likely to become the all time leading scorer in Minnesota big school basketball history. Hurt is coming off a summer that earned him the ranking of 4th nationally, he pushed his Grassroots team into the top five in the nation, and Hurt was one of the top two high school players on the USA 18 and Under team.
The Top Contenders. Zeke Nnaji. David Roddy. Tyler Wahl. Courtney Brown Jr. Tyrell Terry.
Arizona bound Zeke Nnaji has produced 51 points and 16 rebounds combined his first two games. Nnaji had 20 in the Hopkins setback against top ranked East Ridge but helped his team bounce back with 31 points in the Tuesday night win over Orono.
Breck picked up a two point victory over Cristo Rey Jesuit on Tuesday out-fighting a hungry group of young Lycans. In that win David Roddy scored 24 points and was able to get his team a 1-0 record. Roddy is a nationally ranked top 200 talent headed to Colorado State.
The Raptors of East Ridge have several big games throughout the winter and the first test was a big one, the Hopkins Royals. East Ridge won that game on Saturday beating Hopkins and Milwaukee bound senior Courtney Brown Jr knocked out three three-pointers and scored 17 points.
So far Tyler Wahl has really set himself apart from the other guys on this list. He was unstoppable in a four score win over Edina putting up 29 points on 10 of 10 shooting plus grabbed a dozen boards and dished out five assists. Then in a 19 point win over Century he had 28 before having a seat somewhat early in the second half.
One of the biggest wins of the season was DeLaSalle beating Eden Prairie. In that game Stanford bound Tyrell Terry not only scored 28 with eight assists and seven boards but he also made sure that Jamison Battle had the ball in spots to exploit the cracks in the EP defense. Then against Apollo, Terry had 18 and sat down very early as it was a 35 point blowout.
Top Ten List. We gave you a top ten group and a top 25 level group for the award last week. Who has done stuff to standout from that group so far in this early season?
Jeremy Beckler was a monster in the White Bear Lake win over Cambridge dominating the middle for 32 points and 17 boards. Southwest Minnesota State committed Sam Schwartz, another WBL Bear, had 27 himself in that victory. Watch out for the Bears!
As we said earlier, Jamison Battle had 21 in the win over Eden Prairie and then dominated Apollo with 31 points in about 20 minutes time.