CHICAGO – Saturday’s second day of the fourth Chicago Elite Classic in the University of Illinois-Chicago Pavilion covered six games and nine-plus hours – and a healthy helping of impressive individual performances, a stunning sequence to send a game into overtime and an over-powering team effort.
In order, those were:
*Six-foot-seven Duke-bound St. Louis Chaminade High’s Jayson Tatum more than “stuffed” a stat line:
He choked it.
Tatum, conservatively one of the three best players in the Class of 2016, scored 40 points with 11 rebounds, seven assists (and six turnovers), three blocked shots and two steals to help his team win in overtime over Lithonia (GA) Miller Grove, 86-77.
That the game went into overtime was bordered on the mind-boggling.
With his team trailing by six points, Miller Grove’s Connecticut-bound guard Alterique Gilbert (who finished with 32 points, five assists and three steals) drilled a 3-pointer from the left wing with a timeout immediately called by Miller Grove Coach Sharman White.
The clock was stopped with 1.2 seconds remaining but an official told the clock keeper to make it 2.0.
And that’s all the Wolverines needed to put the game into an extra four-minute period.
Reggie Crawford, whose second-quarter scoring (four 3s and a tap-in) helped keep Chaminade in front by a deuce at intermission, inbounded a pass to seal the game – but it was picked off by Miller Grove’s Aaron Augustin a step behind the 3-point arc on the left side of the court.
He literally snatched the ball and turned in the same motion to launch the shot that swished as the buzzer sound to tie the score at 68.
But Tatum wasn’t going to let any more histrionics delay his team’s victory as he scored 10 points in the extra four minutes to seal the deal.
*All in the all, the most impressive start-to-finish performance by a team in the nine games played was turned in by Washington, D.C.’s Gonzaga Prep.
Coach Steve Turner’s club got double-figure scoring out of four underclassmen – led by junior point guard Chris Lyke’s 18 points – to hand Illinois squad Riverside-Brookfield its first loss after a 5-zip start, 78-64.
Sophomores Prentiss Hubb and Myles Dread combined for 28 points, 18 rebounds and 10 assists.
In other games played Saturday:
*Only Tatum’s performance one-upped that turned in by 6-7 junior Christian Negron during the 60-54 victory by Elgin (IL) Larkin over East St. Louis.
Negron had 20 points, 15 rebounds, four assists, two turnovers, five blocked shots and three steals.
He plays a whole like the way that San Antonio Spurs standout Kawhi Leonard did – with the same physical dimensions and attributes – when Leonard was a junior at Martin Luther King High in Riverside (CA).
*Four players, led by senior 6-3 wing Jamal Burton’s 18 points (he also had 10 rebounds and five steals), scored in double figures as Chicago Morgan Park opened its season by knocking off in-state foe Evanston, 71-59.
Guards Charles Moore (Memphis) and Jarrin Randall (Western Michigan), who signed national letters of intent last month, scored 14 points apiece.
Junior wing Nojel Eastern led all scorers with 19 points for Evanston, which suffered its first loss to drop to 4-1.
*Hyattsville (MD) DeMatha improved to 2-zip while toppling Akron (OH) St. Vincent-St. Joseph, 65-57, behind the play of two of the most gifted high school players, regardless of class.
Senior Markelle Fultz, who signed with the University of Washington last month, hit seven of 10 shots from the field (three of four of those from behind the arc) en route to a 23-point effort while also collecting six assists, four rebounds and two steals.
His teammate, 2017 prospect D.J. Harvey, added 15 points to go with a game-high 11 rebounds.
A very good senior without much in the way of national notoriety, 6-4 Henry Baddley, kept his team within striking distance most of the way with 23 points and eight rebounds.
He signed with Butler in November.
*And, in the final game of the evening (which didn’t tip until 15 or so minutes after its scheduled 8:30 start do to the Chaminade-Miller Grove overtime, Simeon held off Chicago rival Whitney Young, 56-51.
Gonzaga University-bound left hander Zach Norvell was far and away the best player in the game while scoring 19 points and grabbing eight rebounds as Simeon was able to prevail wobbling down the stretch after building an 18-point advantage in the third quarter.
