SoCal’s 2023 Breakout Candidates (Pt. 1)

<p>With many states, including California, still struggling to figure out how to play the high school basketball season amid increasing COVID-19 case numbers, we wanted to take a closer look at each class in our region.</p> <p>In this piece, we break down the players in the class of 2023 who would have broken out at this point in the season for their high school teams if it had gone as normally scheduled.</p> <p><strong>[player_tooltip player_id="994936" first="Jacob" last="Huggins"]</strong>, Harvard-Westlake - Wolverines head coach David Rebibo had plenty of praise for Huggins when asked about him, saying the 6-foot-8 forward would have stepped in to the starter’s minutes left behind by [player_tooltip player_id="536629" first="Mason" last="Hooks"]. Huggins is a skilled prospect who has improved on his footwork, athleticism and ability to spread the floor with his jump shot during this downtime. </p> <p><strong>[player_tooltip player_id="996387" first="Denzel" last="Hines"]</strong>, Colony - Hines got a lot of court time as a freshman for the Titans last season and the 6-foot-6 forward showed flashes of upside plenty of times during those minutes. The sophomore is extremely light on his feet, has quickness off the floor when grabbing rebounds and contesting shots in the paint and changes ends of the floor quickly and with purpose. Hines was still in that awkward phase of finding a balance between big man and perimeter play and we were looking forward to seeing the progress he has made over the last year.</p> <p><strong>[player_tooltip player_id="994925" first="Dennis" last="Evans"]</strong>, Hillcrest - We’ve seen Evans log some fall and winter minutes playing with Team Inland in some local club events and his improvements are eye-opening. The 7-footer out of Riverside-based Hillcrest Had some really nice tools to work with even as a freshman, but he has since become more fluid in his low block movements and has more pop off the floor when finishing around the basket. It’s rare to see a skilled 7-footer at a young age, but Evans has plenty of tools to work with.</p> <p><strong>[player_tooltip player_id="994957" first="Elijah" last="Nelson"]</strong>, Fountain Valley - Nelson played solid minutes off the bench for the Barons in their historic 2019-20 season, but there were times where he couldn’t get out of his own way whether it was getting into foul trouble or playing a bit too fast. What we’ve seen from the 6-foot-2 guard recently is that the game has slowed down a bit for him resulting in better decision-making on both ends of the floor. Nelson is a great slasher and finisher in transition and half court settings and has the mentality and physical ability to guard multiple positions. The next step for him will be to improve his ball handling and shooting to mold into that pure perimeter player that he can be.</p>