Taya Reimer accepts her Wootten Player
of the Year award.*Courtesy of mcdaag.com.
CHICAGO -- The 36th Annual McDonalds All-American game is right around the corner and while we wait and anticipate the arrival of the actual game on Wednesday April 3rd, the weeks festivities have already started including 9 a.m. practices that have been as interesting and competitive as we hope the actual game will be.
In addition to the practices we also had the Powerade Jam Fest preliminary and final rounds on Monday evening. The Jam Fest is where the McDonalds game crowns the 3-point champion and the skill champion for the girls and in addition to those awards, for the boys, the dunk contest champion also is awarded. With a full day and a half of competitions and practices in the books here is a look at the sights and sounds from the opening sessions at the McDonalds game.
PRACTICE STANDOUTS
East
The East team is dominated by long athletes, namely Kaela Davis, Diamond DeSheilds, Iesha Small, and Nia Coffey. Their length and presence on both sides of the floor is nothing short of impressive. When you throw in quality guard play with players like Lexie Brown, Makayla Epps, and Lindsay Allen on the roster you really have something. It will be fun to see if the East can speed the game up and use their superior athleticism to create easy baskets in transition.
West
In contrast to the athleticism and length on the East, the West roster is a group of specialists. They have a collection of shooters, Rebecca Greenwell, Rebekah Dahlman and Kelsey Plum, highly skilled post players in Mercedes Russell, Kailee Johnson and Oderah Chidom, and a couple of energy players in Erica McCall and Linnae Harper. The key to the game for the West will be scoring the ball in the halfcourt and finding ways to get their shooters open looks from the outside.
WHO BROUGHT IT AT PRACTICE
One of the most exciting things about McDonalds All-American practice is watching a collection of the best kids in the country compete against each other. There are only a few settings on the summer circuit that provide the kind of five-on-five competition from top to bottom that the McDonalds All-American practices do. Typically when a player like Harper drives past her defender and gets to the rim the help defender isnt an elite post player like Russell or Alaina Coates. Here is a look at a couple of players who brought it and competed in the practices.
Kailee JohnsonStanford
Johnson was solid here in her showings at practice. She seemed to embrace physical play more than she has in previous times that we have seen her and seemed locked in to play well.
Taya ReimerNotre Dame
Reimer has done an excellent job getting into elite shape and developing her body for college. She looks to be in the best shape of her prep career and should be able to use that to her advantage in both the McDonalds game and the WBCA game later in the week.
Jessica WashingtonNorth Carolina
Washington came in this week and took both the skills and the practice sessions seriously. She was able to win the skill competition on Monday night and managed to show well in the live action during the practices. The future Tar Heel point guard showed well here. Follow @KeilMoorePSB
Moore is the National Director of Scouting for the JumpOffPlus.com National Scouting Report. He can be reached at keil@prospectsnation.com.
