Darius Morris. Darius Morris scored 20 points (the tournament website only had him for 17) on 7 of 14 shooting for Belmont Shore in a loss to DC Triple Threat at Reebok (game recap). Darius added 11 points in Belmont’s second game, a  43-56 loss to LA Dream team.

Streaming. You should be able to stream the Darius Morris and Belmont Shore’s next game against Worldwide Orange (Ari Stewart, Richard Howell) LIVE from WazooSports.com at 4:15 PST (7:15 EST) right here. You can follow Belmont Shores’s stats here and Darius Morris’ here.

Jordan Morgan. Reader FL Wolve watched Jordan Morgan’s game online yesterday, heres a portion (full link in comments):

Jordan’s approximate stats were 7 points on 3-6 shooting, 1-2 from the line, 7 rebounds, and 1 blocked shot. Again, those stats are approximate as I missed the first few minutes and had some other distractions. King James won the game although I didn’t catch the final score. The guards for King James played much better in this game than the last game I saw where they got blown out.

As far as Jordan’s overall game, he put up some decent numbers but he was going up against an absolute monster. If I didn’t know better, I would have sworn that Amare Stoudamire had walked into the gym and suited up for the Cali team (ED: It was Jeremy Tyler #1 in 2010). The kid even wore #1. The dunks that he was throwing down beside, over, and around the entire King James team was dizzying. I’ve never seen a high school kid with the kind of power dunks that this kid had. That said, Morgan was still playing him tough and had a few nice deflections. The problem that I saw was that Jordan likes to go for tips and deflections so every time he went for one and missed, the Cali kid caught the ball, spun around, and threw down an uncontested dunk.

Notes. Glen Rice Jr. is set to announce his college choice on Thursday (it’s not Michigan).

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• Ranked players at Reebok Summer Championships (Darius Morris)
• Ranked players at Adidas Super 64 (Givon Crump, Carl Jones, Nate Lubick)
• Ranked players at Main Event (Roger Franklin)

One other recruiting note, ESPN posted this scoutring report on Jordan Morgan last week:

Morgan is an inside banger who will add his toughness to the University of Michigan. Being a Detroit product, he seems to have a full understanding of the responsibility he has to represent Michigan every time he steps on the floor. We were very impressed with his serious approach to the games and the improved intensity as the tournament moved into bracket play. Jordan was a man among boys in the paint and helped the King James Shooting Stars reach the finals. His foul trouble in the first half really hurt King James’ championship quest. Morgan’s job was to rebound, defend, bang inside and score from the low post, and he improved every game in this tournament.

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It is really hard to determine what all these games really mean. The positives for Laval are that he gets to travel the world and play competitive basketball for the first time since December of last year. For comparison Zack Gibson averaged 6 points and 4 rebounds in last years Jones Cup including a 12 point/9 rebound game against Kazakhstan. Lucas-Perry averaged around 10 points per game but had a 22 point outburst against Taiwan.

Here are Lucas-Perry’s final combined stats through the first 8 games. He averaged 9.78 ppg on 40% (26% 3pt) shooting with 3.33 rebounds, .67 assists, 1.22 steals, and 1.44 turnover.. The obvious issues are the assists, shooting percentages and turn over numbers but given the circumstances of the tournament and the fact that the AIA team was basically just thrown together some of this can be expected.

Overall, this trip was a good way for Laval to knock some rust off. I really don’t think this trip can tell us whether LLP has what it takes to be that consistent third scorer that we need him to be or not. At the very least it gives us a shot to see him on some video and look at some numbers.

Other Notes: Darius Morris is playing in the Reebok Championships next week in Las Vegas. Add Florida Gulf Coast to this years schedule. Reed Baker returns to Crisler Arena! 7 footer transfers to OSU from UAB.

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Beilein left the door slightly ajar about Benzing showing up in Ann Arbor at some point but I find it very unlikely that he would goto prep school or something at this point when he can play pro-ball in Europe.

“Robin is a fine young man and we will continue to provide him with the NCAA information he will need if he continues to pursue options in the United States. If he does not pursue these options, I assume he will begin playing at a professional level in Europe starting this fall.”

I was excited about Benzing, and he seemed like a great fit but most likely wouldn’t have been eligible this year anyways. The real issue here is the damage to the recruiting game plan, it’s time to scramble.

Now Michigan is in a jam, Andy Brown was huge on Michigan early (and they were seemingly very interested) but the recruitment fizzled after Benzing’s commitment. Michigan had started focusing almost entirely on point guards and wing forwards. With the post position already so depleted, this is just another blow. It is an absolutely necesity to land a power forward in the 09 class. The problem is, there aren’t that many power forwards who are really on the U-M radar. Michigan has to at least make a try to get back involved with Andy Brown but after that they have to cast a wide net of other power forwards.

With Benzing off the board I updated the scholarship breakdown.

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ESPN had this to say on 2009 wing Givon Crump at the RBK Showcase:

Six-foot-7 senior forward Givon Crump (Wolfeboro, N.H./Brewster) impressed once again with his ability to make shots and impact the game with his athleticism. Crump has a thick build and is much quicker than he looks. He’ll need to improve his game off the dribble if he hopes to play full time on the perimeter in college.

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“I’m thankful obviously for what I have,” Novak said. “The biggest thing is the hard work that’s gone into making it happen. You can have all the God-given ability in the world, but at some point you’ve got to work at it.”

The process of figuring out which direction to go wasn’t a simple one. Early on, Novak played soccer, but a broken ankle ended his days as a forward, at least on grass, in seventh grade. He had brief fling with cross country in eighth grade, using it as conditioning for basketball. He cracked the top five before back problems ended that.

That spring, in track, he was the Lake-Porter Conference champion in the high jump, long jump and the 400-meter relay. He was only beaten in three events all season, including a loss by 2 inches in the long jump to Taft’s Randy Hudi, who won a medal in the event at state this year for Crown Point.

“I got pretty upset when I lost in that,” Novak said. “Once I started playing, it was impossible for me to accept things going wrong.”

Read the whole article here, congrats again to Novak and can’t wait to see him in the Maize and Blue. Thanks to Sheryl for the link.

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Some information is out there from national events this week about Carl Jones, Michigan’s #2 point guard target at this time. First from the RivalsHoops (free):

Despite a hamstring injury Rivals.com top 150 prospect Carl Jones was in the building supporting his Ohio Basketball Club teammates. Jones says he has offers from Iowa, Penn State, Texas Tech, St. Joe’s, and Marquette. He also mentioned that Michigan is still showing a lot of interest despite not offering.

ESPN had this scouting report on Carl Jones at the LeBron Skills Academy:

Jones has the ability to score in a variety of ways. He can connect with relative ease from beyond 3-point land, but he also has the quickness to penetrate to the basket. Though small, he uses an assortment of floaters and angles to get his shots off in the paint amongst the trees.

Rivals also mentions that Justin Jordan, another 2009 point guard also mentions Michigan as well as Texas Tech,  Purdue, Butler, LSU, and Virginia.

If you have premium on Rivals they have both posted tons of team/elite camp video over the past week: Novak, Lubick, Morgan, and Elite Camp. 2010 point guard Ray McCallum Jr. will attend Detroit Country Day next year. Vince at PrepSpotlight has a great report ($) on Manny and DeShawn at the LeBron Academy where they were counselors and also got to play with LeBron and Chris Paul. Not a lot of mention of Darius this week who was apparently slowed with a back injury for most of the week. One more note, Givon Crump is blowing up at RBK U and he is certainly a wing target to watch (again sorry for adding this late).

From the Jones Cup, Laval Lucas-Perry scored 14 points and notched 2 steals in Day 2 action during an easy win over Qatar. It also looks like Laval had 9 vs Jordan in an opening day loss (Taiwain Hoops).

Laval Lucas-Perry had a fastbreak dunk, a three and a three-point play in the second quarter as AIA led by as many as 14 points.

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Solomon Hill recently was offered by USC on an unofficial visit putting the Trojans at the top of his school list along with Arizona, who has also offered. Hill plans to unofficially visit Arizona later this summer and then officially visit Kansas State (offer), Washington State (offer) and Oregon State. Florida State, San Diego State (offer), Texas and SMU (offer) are also on his list.

Glen Rice has an offer from Georgia Tech. Florida State and Miami are the other two schools on his three team school list.

Roger Franklin stated that Indiana was still solidly on his list despite the recent troubles for the program along with Michigan State, Arizona (offer), Utah (offer), Oklahoma State (offer), Baylor (offer) and Memphis.

“Indiana is a basketball powerhouse and right now I’m still high on them,” said Franklin. “They have a great coach in Tom Crean. And I know they have lost a lot of players, but that means there is a great opportunity to play and that’s why they are still on my list.”

If you are looking for more positive news, Scout put up a two part video interview series with Darius Morris.

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• Day 1 7-7-08
  
• Day 2 7-8-08
  

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