READING, Pa. – By late Sunday night, everyone at Albright College was dragging, from AAU and college coaches to players and even their parents. The July live recruiting period can have that effect.
Raising Champions, a Queens-based AAU program which struggled much of the month, was tired too – though the team refused to let it show in its play.
“It was mind over matter,” said former Edison standout Cavon Baker, who is headed to NIA Prep (N.J.) to improve his college prospects for a postgraduate year. “We didn’t care if we weren’t 100 percent. We wanted to come here and win. It was important to leave a lasting mark on these coaches’ mind.”
Mission accomplished.
They won all three of their games in the Hoop Group/New Heights End of Summer Classic, claiming the 17U gold championship, their first of the AAU season on its final day, by outclassing the Shooting Stars, 73-38.
Baker, who has drawn interest from St. Peter’s, Radford, Marist and Quinnipiac, was named tournament MVP after scoring 26 points. Wings Academy’s Justin Jenkins joined Raising Champions for the one-day tournament, scored 11 points in the final and fit in perfectly with Baker.
“He helped,” Raising Champions coach J.R. Rodriguez said of Jenkins. “He’s a tough guard. He made plays and hit shots.”
Raising Champions were on the road for much of July, traveling to Las Vegas for the Fab 48 and Springfield, Mass., for the Hall-of-Fame Invitational, but injuries, late-game mistakes and blown leads undermined them. Sunday they added Jenkins and never lost focus.
“Today we did a better job of holding onto leads,” he said. “In the past, we didn’t stay aggressive, started playing soft.”
Baker said: “After a bad performance in Vegas, this was our first tournament so we were all hungry to turn it around. We sacrificed our offense and our defense got better. We played better as a team.”
That wasn’t a problem against the Shooting Stars in the final. Raising Champions raced out to a 25-13 lead, was up 42-23 at the half and never looked back. Jenkins, Baker and Holy Cross guards Will Davis (seven points) and Marquise Moore created problems for the Shooting Stars in transition and Thomas Edison’s Jaleel Charles (nine points) and the Kent School’s Stefon Williams made their impact in the paint.
“It’s a good way to end the summer, winning a championship,” Rodriguez said. “It’s sweet for the kids.”