Video: Midnight Madness Newcastle Qualifier

The Newcastle qualifier was the 3rd event in Midnight Madness’s Summer itinerary (after Midnight Madness Portsmouth and Midnight Madness Milton Keynes). The big thing that stood out to me at Newcastle was the presence the Newcastle Eagles seemed to have on the area-there were tons of young kids around bouncing balls, and when Darius Defoe showed up and played a lil bit in the Show & Prove session (footage on it’s way) the place was going nuts.

On to the actual events, there were 3 people that really stood out for me. The Under 18’s were dominated by Helio Sampaio who was the highest qualifier on the day with 36 points (check out this Helio Sampaio video which was released a couple of weeks ago), gunnin’ 3s, crossing people up and making some sweet dishes, Sampaio was the star of the young’ns. Other shout outs in Under 18s go to Chris Hughes, who is a straight up baller currently out stateside in High school in Virginia, Davide Wakanena, Jamal Lewis and Dave Oluduji who played big.

The Under 23’s again were all about one person. My boy Ian Berry who I grew up playing with. After spending a season on the bench at Worthing Thunder, and having a through and through disappointing run at Portsmouth, he came with a chip on his shoulder. Having his vast offensive skills on full display, no-one came close to stopping him-if he wasn’t scoring on people he was drawing fouls and getting to the line, a down right impressive performance.

Anyway, enough of the talking, check out the vid and let me know what you think!