Manchester Magic Take the Title-Solent Kestrels Pre-Season U18 Tourney Day 2 - Hoopsfix.com

Manchester Magic Take the Title-Solent Kestrels Pre-Season U18 Tourney Day 2

Manchester Magic came away victorious at the Solent Kestrels Pre-Season U18 Tournament on Sunday, defeating Leicester Warriors 48-43 in the final.

Leicester Warriors did well to make a game of it after going down 14-0 to start the game as Manchester’s Josh McGinn came out gunnin’, but couldn’t overcome the hump, suffering a 5 point defeat.

The four teams to make it through to the semi finals, were the aforementioned Manchester Magic and Leicester Warriors, as well as Taunton Tigers and Reading Rockets. I am awaiting the full results and leading scorers, but in the meantime here is the All Tournament Team, Finals MVP and a few random thoughts from myself.

All Tournament Team

John Gould (Manchester Magic)
Lewis Champion (Reading Rockets)
Raph Thomas Edwards (Leicester Warriors)
Elliot Sentance (Leicester Warriors)
Jordan Grindrod (Taunton Tigers)

Finals MVP

Dujon Lattie (Manchester Magic)

Random Thoughts/Notes

  • The first game of the day provided some drama, with Reading’s Lewis Champion hitting a clutch three at the buzzer in OT to give the Rockets a 36-33 victory over Manchester (video coming soon). Not gonna lie, when he hadn’t made his move with 3 seconds remaining I didn’t think he was going to get a shot off, but credit where it’s due. Big.
  • Though I can’t argue too much with the final All Tournament Team, the 5 I submitted (I selected based on positions, in the 5 that were chosen there is 4 guards) were- Lewis Champion, Elliot Sentance, Jack Preston (Solent Kestrels), Raph Thomas Edwards, Jack Crook (Manchester Magic)
  • The Leicester duo of Elliot Sentance and Raph Thomas-Edwards is going to cause a lot of teams problems this season. Elliot was easily the best offensive player in this tournament (still only a ’94 born I believe) and Raph is a monster when he chooses to be, being a lot more dominant on Day 2.
  • Talking of Raph, he brought a couple of highlight dunks on Day 2 as well as a blooper-going for the dunk, missing and semi hanging on the rim-his momentum resulted in him doing a full flip in the air and landing on his head. One for Failblog.
  • The final was by far the best game of the tournament to watch (which I guess, should be expected). Dujon Lattie, Manchester’s point guard was the deserved MVP, displaying his lightning quickness throughout the game.
  • There were a lot of ‘projects’ on display, none more so than Joseph Mowczan and Will Jewell , two 6’11 guys who play in Reading’s front court. It was Joseph’s first ever competitive basketball, and Will is only a 1994 born (and yes he is 6’11!), it’s still early days but you know what they say-you can’t teach height!
  • Manchester’s 6’9″ 1993 born big man Jack Crook is an interesting prospect. Has surprisingly good co-ordination for a big man and an ability to finish-did damage against every team he played, though needs to work on his strength.
  • I know I said it in the Day 1 recap, but it definitely seems to be transitional year for the U18’s. So many core guys from each team has left, and there is a ton of young guys coming through. I expect the overall talent pool to see a drop and as a result the better players dominate even more.
  • Huge thanks to the Solent Kestrels and Bev Guymon for organising the tournament, I know a lot of hard work and preparation went into it. In particular I need to shout out Ben Stanley and Matt Guymon for personally sorting me out all weekend, hugely appreciated.

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