The Spring Jam Preview (17U)
The Sanford Pentagon Spring Jam is this weekend at the Sanford Pentagon putting together a nice group of teams from South Dakota and the surrounding areas. Here is the 17U Preview!
Blue Division. This is the top division and it has eight teams broken up into four two team pools. This includes the 17th ranked team in Minnesota which is D1 MN Rise, ECI Prospects, the Dakota Schoolers, and the top North Dakota Phenom team. The Schoolers and Phenom are playing in a pool play game.
The Rise has already played in nine games winning five of them. They have one of Minnesota’s better 2019 players Isaac Fink plus top 75 Minnesota senior prospects Michael Coble, Bjorn Knutson, Damani Hayes, and Uhana Ochan. The Phenom has played in one event so far and they were 1-3 in that event. They are a huge team with Josh Kihle up front, Bartholomew Ogbu, and the Stecklers.
The Dakota Schoolers have not played yet so they will be making their debut in their homestate. Trevor Hanson, Mason Larson, Aaron Fiegen, AJ Plitzuweit, Jeffrey Schuch, Koln Oppold, and others are all together on a very good looking team.
BBA is playing in their second event. They went 2-3 three weeks ago in an Iowa event and now are playing in their home area. Game one is against the Minnesota Rice. BBA has the Jankes (Jadon and Jaxon), Christian Beachler from Canton, Manny Akot who is a big with potential from Washington, Ace Zorr from Harrisburg, and others.
The ECI Prospects are also making their debut. They usually play in the Comets Shootout but they had to miss it because of so many guys missing because of prom. That means the debut for guys like Josh Sipes, Kade Amundson, Joe Pistorius, Hunter Burchill, and others. It’s game one, game on for ECI.
Also in the top division is a solid Minnesota Basketball Academy team from the west metro of the Twin Cities (Austin Carter is a nice scorer for them and watch out for Parker Bjorklund who was an all tourney player two weeks ago), Nebraska Bison, and the Southwest Minnesota Stars who are also making their debut. The Stars include huge number producer Noah Slagter, guard Trey Lance, wing scorer Mitch Irlbeck, and a sleeper to know in Anthony Ross.
Orange Division. Another eight team division by the Dakota teams. ECI and North Dakota Regional come in from North Dakota while from South Dakota there is the South Dakota Heat, two Pentagon teams (Jewett and Knippling), the Dakota Niners, and the second BBA Force squad coached by Brian Stoebner. Add in West Central United’s second squad and you have the eight team field.
West Central United has played in one event in St. Cloud and the ECI Select squad has played in four games losing three of them (the exact same thing can be said about North Dakota Phenom’s Regional squad). The rest of the group has not played in a game yet. Who wins? Tough to know but whomever does will have a nice jumpstart to this season.