Local results from EYBL, UAA, & Adidas

Sunday, July 14th, 2019

Each of the three major sneaker circuits held season culminating events last week during the live period.

The Nike EYBL Finals took place at the Peach Jam in North Augusta, South Carolina while EYBL teams that didn’t qualify took part in the Peach Invitational Tournament in nearby Augusta, Georgia. The Adidas Gauntlet Summer Championships took part in Birmingham, Alabama and the Under Armour Association Finals, preceded by session IV, happened just outside of Atlanta, Georgia.

New England was represented at all three. Here’s a look at how the local teams faired.

Nike EYBL

Expressions opened the Peach Jam with a disappointing 86-63 loss to the Family but quickly regrouped. They suffered a hard-fought loss at the hands of the NY Rens Thursday morning 79-76 and then won back-to-back games against Boo Williams and Team Final. That set the stage for a Friday night game against Phenom University, featuring Duke commit Jalen Johnson and the top ranked rising junior in the country Patrick Baldwin. A win would push Expressions into the quarterfinals while a loss would end their season. The game went down to the very last second and was an absolute heartbreaker as Phenom tipped in an offensive rebound to win at the buzzer. Despite the dramatic loss it was nonetheless still a productive week for a number of players. Terrence Clarke scored 19 or more points in three of the five games while Moussa Cisse averaged 13 points, 12 rebounds, and 3-and-a-half blocks per game. Bensley Joseph had a particularly good week. He went for 12 points, 11 assists, and 5 steals vs. Phenom and 25 points, 9 assists, and 6 rebounds vs. Boo Williams. Dyondre Dominguez was in double figures three times including a 22-point performance against Boo Williams and a 14 point outing vs. Team Final. Trey Hall had 15 points and 6 rebounds against the Rens while Erickson Bans had his best game of the week against Boo Williams with 11 points, 7 rebounds, and 2 assists.

At the PIT, a short-handed BABC team opened with a 71-70 win over Team United before falling to Drive Nation. They rattled off back-to-back wins in bracket play with a 75-73 decision over Georgia Stars and a 77-74 win over E1T1 before falling to Bluff City Legends on Saturday morning. Quest Harris went for 22 points, 5 rebounds, and 5 assists over E1T1 while Matt Cross put up 20 points and 8 rebounds and Josh Ogundele 18 points and 8 rebounds. That frontcourt duo was even betters against Georgia Stars as Ogundele put up 17 and 19 while Cross had 22 and 6. Dante Law also had his biggest game of the week with 17 points including three threes.

Under Armour Association

NE6 came into the event with a much different roster than they had during the spring in which they finished with one of the best records in the UAA regular season. Cairo McCrory had 21 points and 6 rebounds in an opening win over Team Rio but unfortunately went down with an ankle injury shortly afterward. Sean James added 14 points in the opener and was in double figures a couple more times before the week came to an end. Kai Kostmayer had 14 points against We-R1 on Friday while Kyle Jenkins and Corey McKeithan each had 15 against Houston Defenders. McKeithan finished the week in a big way with a 27-point outing on Sunday against New Heights.

Adidas Gauntlet

The Mass Rivals had an inspired run this week that led them to the Elite 8 of the Adidas Summer Championships before falling in a heartbreaker to Garner Road, 55-54. They opened the week with pool play wins over Exum Elite and Game Elite JB. Jordan Geronimo exploded for 26 points against Exum, in what would spark a breakout week for the rising senior. DeMarr Langford and Dallion Johnson both had 13 over Game Elite while Chris Robinson and Marty Silvera added 9 each. The Rivals knocked off Indiana Elite East in the opening round of bracket play behind 16 and 12 points respectively for Johnson and Silvera. Next up was a big 77-43 win over Young and Reckless as Casey Simmons and Geronimo each had 18. The round of 16 featured a match-up against local nemesis, NY Jayhawks, in which the Rivals would take 60-55 behind 17 more points from Johnson and 16 from Langford. Langford, Geronimo, and Simmons all played well in the match-up with Garner Road, finishing with 16, 15, and 12 respectively.