NHR State 17U Final: Top Five Performers
The NHR State 17u Tournament completed Sunday afternoon with the Comets defeating the Matrix. What five players stood out the most in that game? Matt Willert Minnesota Comets 65 Matrix 60 – Top Five Performers One. Matthew Willert. When you…
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Continue ReadingThe NHR State 17u Tournament completed Sunday afternoon with the Comets defeating the Matrix. What five players stood out the most in that game?
Matt WillertMinnesota Comets 65 Matrix 60 – Top Five Performers
One. Matthew Willert. When you look through the stats and review the game tape you will see that there is one item that the Matrix couldn’t consistently account for and that was the range on Matt Willert’s jumper. Because Matt spends all his time on the perimeter you have to guard Willert with a wing who is commonly shorter because Matt is 6-foot-6. That immediately is an edge for the Comets because the perfect closeout is needed to contest Matt’s shot, which in turns stretches out the defense. Add in high quality ball movement and Matt makes a scrambling pay consistently. Willert scored a game high 20 points on four makes at the arc and 7 of 14 shooting over all.
Two. Noah King. The defense does not become scrambled if the leader of the team doesn’t ignite the offense the right way, and continue to move the ball the right way, and make open shots in the needed way. Noah King made sure that the Comets offense was moving the right way. The toughest/strongest (combo) 2020 lead guard in the upper Midwest may just be Noah King and his ten points, five assists, and five boards were crucial to the Comets victory plan.
Three. Cooper Olson. We now land on the third key piece of the Comets winning formula, Cooper Olson. The Matrix had some guys big enough, and some guys quick enough, but they didn’t have a guy that was big enough AND quick enough to defend Cooper on an island in the title game. Why were they on an island? Because of the shooting and ball movement previously mentioned and from there Olson used his agile 6-foot-7 size to take advantage. Cooper scored with his back to the basket or facing using the space on either side of him to complete. His spins and quick dribble moves are tough to deal with and then Olson is quick off his feet to the make. Add in the off ball makes and you have a 17 point game on 7 of 9 shooting.
Four. Tate Machacek. The Comets size had a tough time with the 6-foot-6 Tate Machacek because he out-worked them on the glass using his motor and leverage, and Tate was the best frontcourt player playing on the perimeter in the title game. Tate hit consistently from the arc all weekend and that didn’t change in the title game when the Eastview veteran made a pair of threes scoring 15 points in all (shot 6 of 7 from the field). Tate missed a double-double by one rebound.
Five. Will Cordes. We in Minnesota have some talented 17u guards that may be shorter in height (basketball prospect wise) but are big in production. Will Cordes is big on production plus he is one of the best shooters in the senior class. A game is never over when Will is on the court as Cordes proved in the title game yesterday. Will made three triples, all his foul shots, and a couple pull-ups pushing his total to 19 points for the contest. The Matrix didn’t bring him the big prize but the team took a big step forward with wins over Heat Vang, Select Cave, and a FAB team that had Lu’Cye Patterson, and Will was a big part of that.
Sisk & Jennissen
At some point this summer the NHR prospect rankings for the 2020 class will come out and people are going to see Calvin Sisk of the Comets (Rockford) and Jacob Jennissen of the Matrix (Sauk Centre) both in the top dozen at least (and in past years I would comfortably say top ten right now but this isn’t the past). I didn’t include Calvin or Jacob in the above column because they deserve their own portion of this article.
The improvements made by seven footer Calvin Sisk and 6-foot-11 Jacob Jennissen are incredible! They are players that high major programs should be looking into and mid-major/low-major programs should be all over, because they are so unique. Size that is both agile, active, productive, and just scratching the surface is hard to find and both of these bigs fit that perfectly.
Watching Calvin and Jacob go back and forth at each was excellent. Jennissen had the upper hand scoring on three more possessions than Sisk but the Matrix also had two less guys so Jacob played more, but what mattered was that both played well.
Jacob shot 6 of 11 from the field with a three made while Calvin started slow before scoring on four of ten possessions total. Both players had eight rebounds, both players had multiple blocks, and many contests, and both players earned a lot of respect from the state of Minnesota this weekend.
College coaches I can not stress to you enough how important it is to get to the MBCA Showcase on June 21 and 22 to see these guys for yourself.