Stephens: McDonalds Game a Slice of Redemption

By Mitch Stephens

MaxPreps.com

BAY AREA, Calif. – The journey begins late Easter night heading for high school basketball’s biggest and most glamorous get together – the McDonald’s All-American game in Milwaukee.

I’m taking Bay Area Rapid Transit’s (BART's) longest and lonliest trek from Pittsburg to San Francisco International Airport. There are a couple gritty souls pulling off the “S” trifecata several seats up: snoozing, snoring and slobbering.

Other than them I’m the only one occupying this car.

But like Red (Morgan Freeman) fidgeting in the bus during the final scene of “Shawshank Redemption,” I find I’m so excited I can barely sit still.

Sure, I’m leaving my lovely wife and cuddly 6-year-old to catch a red-eye from the Pacific blue. I’ll endure the indignity of airport security checks and arrive in the Windy City in the wee hours to curl up in a hard O’Hare bench for a couple hours before taking a bumpy 45-minute flight to frigid Wisconsin.

Hey no complaints here.

I get to attend the prep hoops version of the Academy Awards. I get to watch in full flight the high school game's Shangra-Lai. I get to witness the sport's future Kobe Bryants and Lisa Leslies.

Sure, it’s supposed to be a biting 22 degrees when we land at General Mitchell Internationally, but within hours I’ll be gasping at the 40-inch vertical leap of Compton’s DeMar DeRozan or a 360 spin cycle and no look pass from Oak Hill Academy’s Brandon Jennings in practice.

For the first time in person, I get to admire the power game of 6-foot-10, 235-pound man-child Greg Monroe (Helen Cox, La.) or the vast all-around skills of 6-4 forward Elena Delle Donne (Ursuline Academy, Greenville, De.), last week voted Morgan Wootten Award winners as the top 2007-08 male and female players in the country.

I’ve seen live many of the best in California for the last two decades – Jason Kidd, Courtney Paris, Gary Payton, Jayne Appel, Casey Jacobsen, DeMarcus Nelson, Jacki Gemelos and Candice Wiggins to name a few – but now I get the entire bowl of cherries.

Like Red, I’ll give my voice over here over the next three days, sharing impressions, analysis, fun and frolic. Each day we’ll add a daily notebook with facts, figures and other tangeables and throw in some features as well.  

If you somehow haven’t heard or seen yet, here are the prime-time players selected to the games, which are scheduled for Wednesday at 7 p.m. (EST) – girls, followed by the boys at 9:30. The girls game will be carried live on ESPNU and the boys live on ESPN.

Here are 48 reasons I can barely hold a thought in my head.

BOYS EAST

Player, Height, Position, School (City, State) – College

Al-Farouq Aminu, 6-9, F, Norcross (Ga.) – Wake Forest

William Buford, 6-5, G, Libbey (Toledo, Ohio) – Ohio State

Ed Davis, 6-9, F, Benedictine (Richmond, Va.) – North Carolina

Tyreke Evans, 6-6, G, American Christian (Aston, Pa.) – Undecided

JaMychal Green, 6-9, F, St. Jude (Montgomery, Ala.) – Alabama

Sylven Landesberg, 6-6, G, Holy Cross (Flushing, N.Y.) – Virginia

Michael Rosario, 6-3, G, St. Anthony (Jersey City, N.J.) – Rutgers

Samardo Samuels, 6-9, F, St. Benedict’s Prep (Newark, N.J.) – Louisville

Chris Singleton, 6-9, F, Dunwoody (Ga.) – Florida State

Kemba Walker, 6-0, G, Rice (New York, N.Y.) – Connecticut

Elliot Williams, 6-4, G, St. George’s (Collierville, Tenn.) – Duke

Tyler Zeller, 7-0, F, Washington (Ind.) – North Carolina

BOYS WEST

Player, Height, Position, School (City, State) – College

Luke Babbitt, 6-8, F, Galena (Reno, Nev.) – Nevada

Demar DeRozan, 6-6, G, Compton (Calif.) – USC

Larry Drew, 6-0, G, Taft (Woodland Hills, Calif.) – North Carolina

Michael Dunigan, 6-10, F, Farragut (Chicago, Ill.) – Oregon

Jrue Holiday, 6-4, G, Campbell Hall (North Hollywood, Calif.) – UCLA

Scotty Hopson, 6-5, G, University Heights (Hopkinsville, Ky.) – Undecided

Brandon Jennings, 6-2, G, Oak Hill Academy (Mouth of Wilson, Va.) – Arizona

Malcolm Lee, 6-5, G, North (Riverside, Calif.) – UCLA

Greg Monroe, 6-10, F, Helen Cox (Harvey, La.) – Georgetown

B.J. Mullens, 7-1, F, Canal Winchester (Ohio) – Ohio State

Iman Shumpert, 6-4, G, Oak Park-River Forest (Oak Park, Ill.) – Georgia Tech

Willie Warren, 6-4, G, North Crowley (Fort Worth, Texas) – Oklahoma

GIRLS EAST

Player, Height, Position, School (City, State) – College

Elena Delle Donne, 6-4, G/F, Ursuline Academy (Wilmington, Del.) – Connecticut

Amber Gray, 6-1, F, Lakota West (West Chester, Ohio) – Tennessee

Glory Johnson, 6-2, F, Webb School (Knoxville, Tenn.) – Tennessee

Shenise Johnson, 5-11, F, Rush-Henrietta (Henrietta, N.Y.) – Miami

Lynetta Kizer, 6-3, F, Potomac (Woodbridge, Va.) – Maryland

Chelsey Lee, 6-3, F, Parkway Academy (Miramar, Fla.) – Rutgers

Alicia Manning, 6-1, G, Etowah (Woodstock, Ga.) – Tennessee

Samantha Prahalis, 5-7, G, Commack (Dix Hills, N.Y.) – Ohio State

Chay Shegog, 6-3, F, Brooke Point (Stafford, Va.) – North Carolina

Shekinna Stricklen, 6-2, G, Morrilton (Ark.) – Tennessee

April Sykes, 6-1, G, East Oktibbeha (Crawford, Miss.) – Rutgers

She’la White, 5-6, G, Norfolk Collegiate (Portsmouth, Va.) – North Carolina

GIRLS WEST

Player, Height, Position, School (City, State) – College

LaSondra Barrett, 6-2, F, Murrah (Jackson, Miss.) – LSU

Alyssia Brewer, 6-3, F, Sapulpa (Okla.) – Tennessee

Ashley Corral, 5-9, G, Prairie (Brush Prairie, Wash.) – USC

Jasmine Dixon, 5-10, G/F, Long Beach Poly (Long Beach, Calif.) – Rutgers

Ayana Dunning, 6-3, F, Eastmoor Academy (Columbus, Ohio) – LSU

Ashley Gayle, 6-4, F, Bishop Gorman (Las Vegas, Nev.) – Texas

Briana Gilbreath, 6-0, G, Cinco Ranch (Katy, Texas) – USC

Tiffany Hughes, 6-0, G, Winter Haven (Lakeland, Fla.) – Connecticut

Destini Hughes, 5-10, G/F, Kennedale (Texas) – LSU

Nneka Ogwumike, 6-2, F, Cy-Fair (Cypress, Texas) – Stanford

Brooklyn Pope, 6-2, F, Dunbar (Fort Worth, Texas) – Rutgers

Nikki Speed, 5-9, G, Marlborough (Los Angeles, Calif.) – Rutgers

E-mail Mitch Stephens at mstephens@maxpreps.com.