Prospect Spotlight: Josh Vazquez (2019)
Ethan Thompson, the 2017 CIF Southern Section Open Division Player of the Year, is now a freshman at Oregon State University.
And forward Jordan Schakel, a three-time all-Southern Section selection, is in his first year at San Diego State.
Those were key elements for the Torrance Bishop Montgomery program that was the produced the second-best team in California in the 2016 (behind Lonzo Ball and Chino Hills) and the squad that rolled to the State Open Division crown last spring.
But don’t expect much slippage for Coach Doug Mitchell’s Knights in 2017-18.
They return three starters – guards Gianni Hunt and David Singleton (he’s already committed to UCLA) and forward Fletcher Tynen.
And they’ve got numerous key reserves from the past two seasons, most notably 2019 guard Josh Vazquez.
The 6-foot-3 Vazquez, one of the top half-dozen of the standouts at the West Coast Elite End of Summer Camp at El Camino College in Torrance Sunday, played a lot of critical minutes for the Knights as a freshman and a sophomore.
Look for him to rapidly climb the regional and national point guard ratings for his class over the next two seasons, and to have a multitude of college programs in heavy pursuit of him before he can sign a National Letter of Intent in November of 2018.
And chalk that up as a reason why the Knights will have a strong opportunity to defend those Southern Section and State Open titles next spring, even with their graduation losses and the loaded squad Santa Ana Mater Dei is going to put on the floor.
“Our goals are going to remain the same,” Vazquez said, after his first game at El Camino College Sunday. “We’re going to play the same way we’ve always played, playing great defense and trying to get great shots.”
Vazquez was certainly a very good role player as a freshman and especially as a sophomore while competing against in, arguably, the toughest post-season level of competition in high school hoops (the Southern Section’s Open Division).
With Thompson and Schakel in college, “my role is going to change some now,” he said.
“With those guys gone, Coach Mitchell told me I’m going to have to be a little bit more aggressive (as a scorer and playmaker) than I’ve been.”
Anyone who has watched him closely over those past two seasons – as well as this past spring and summer – knows that it’s a challenge that Vazquez is more than up to.