The AAU Qualifier was held this past weekend and although it continues to lose the luster it once had as far as quantity of teams, the quality remains at a very high level. I had a chance to see some of the best players in the area perform against some outstanding competition. The Cy Fair Shock, behind a very talented Kristin Inman, won the 15u or 10TH Grade division. That particular team, with the exception of a couple of players, is really a 9TH Grade team, so I decided to look back at some of the top 2013 players from last season.
Several freshmen made names for themselves this season, none greater than Bellaire's A.J. Alix who put on the most impressive post season offensive performance of any player I have seen in Region 3 history, dropping 32 against Elsik for a chance to go to the Final Four, then putting the Cardinals on her back and scoring 40 against Hightower in the championship game. Alix was named MVP of her district and made an All Greater Houston Post Season team.
Inman, along with Sydney Buchel have taken Seven Lakes from laughing stock to see who laughs last and will be a contender for the Region 3 Final Four for the next three years. Both kids were named first team all district.
Alex Lapeyrolerie from Kempner and Madison Wilson from Clements were named Newcomers of the Year along with being 1ST Team All District. Kiana Ingram, also from Kempner, was named 2ND Team All District and should compliment Lapeyrolerie to form a great dynamic duo.
The Clear Lake area also has some of the top up and coming talent including Brittney Branch, who made 1ST Team All District and was also named Chronicle Player of the Week once, while Taylor Owens, Taylor Longley and Jo Ann Lira all were named 2ND Team All District.
Never before have so many freshmen made their mark so early in Region 3 and this can be attributed to many things, such as everything was spread out, talent wise that is. By that I mean there are more schools and even more transfers. Those reasons, along with fact that the Classes of 2010 and 2011 are not as strong as previous years, plus high school coaches are putting the balls in the younger kids hands earlier,not worried about kids waiting for their turn, has truly changed things.
On the other hand, Region 2 was clearly the better region of the two in the area and here is an example why. Last place Klein beat at least three Region 3 playoff teams, and they probably would have made the playoffs in many districts in Region 3.
Top freshmen from Region 2 were Dekaney's Brianna Taylor, Newcomer of the Year in 13 5A while College Park's Alexia Sanders received the same award in 14 5A. Dominique Dillingham from Klein Collins was named 2ND Team All District in in 13 5A.
Taylor, Inman and Alix are three of the top players in the state in their class right now, all have the potential to be Top 100 in the country, so we will see how it all plays out.
There are several other talented 2013's floating around, I don't know if this class has as many next level players as 2012's guard heavy class does, but it should be a great one and one I will be watching very close.