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High School Nation - Feb. 1

By Chris Hansen
National Director of Scouting
Posted Fri, 02/01/2008 - 09:35 Murrah of Jackson, Miss., leads our weekly look at high-school action, commitment news and rankings from around the country.


Murrah High School is coming off of two straight Mississippi State 5A championships and last week reached its highest national ranking at No. 3 in the ESPN.com poll. It was winners of 20 straight before falling to Brookhaven 44-42 in a late-season non-league game.

The loss dropped Murrah to No. 16 in the ESPN.com rankings and with no out-of-state games or wins over nationally ranked opponents the loss will likely keep the Mustangs from returning to the top 10. Murrah coach Anna Jackson said her team’s focus has been on winning the state championship.

"We try to maintain that focus throughout the year," she said.

While the Mustangs dropped 13 spots in the ESPN.com poll they dropped out of the Top 25 in the Full Court Press rankings.


LaSondra Barrett of Murrah High School has
committed to play for LSU.

“We kind of worry about being ranked at the end of the season and that’s kind of our focus also,” Jackson said. “We enjoy being ranked and we play hard to get ranked. If it doesn’t come then we just want to win the state championship in March.”

Murrah rebounded from Brookhaven loss when it beat Hill by 53 points Tuesday.

“I think we’ve played great basketball thus far and we expect to continue the rest of the season,” Jackson said.

The Mustangs are moving on with their goal of winning the 5A state championship for the third time in a row and what would be the school’s eighth state title in its history.

Murrah played at Brookhaven in the same shootout last season and won by 16. The Mustangs finished the season 37-2, losing just one regular-season game, and then lost to 4A State Champion, Gentry High School, in the finale after the state championships. Mississippi is one of the few states that have the state champions in each classification play off for an overall state crown.

Gentry now sits at No. 14 in the ESPN.com rankings and No. 24 in the Full Court Press rankings, both released this week. If the two teams again clash at the end of the season it is likely the winner will be the sole team from Mississippi representing the state in the national polls. Gentry won last year’s contest 63-58.

Commitment New
The Lone Star State continues to lead the charge in the 2009 class of verbal commitments. This week, two more Texas universities, Texas and Texas Tech, received verbal commitments from the junior class.


Lauren Flores at a North Shore practice.

Mary Bokenkamp, a 5-foot-10 guard from nationally ranked Regis High School in Aurora, Colo., committed to Texas Tech and head coach Kristy Curry. Bokenkamp is known for her long range shooting ability and was recruited by numerous teams in the Big 12, Big East and Pac-10 conferences. This is Texas Tech’s second 2009 commitment already with last week’s commitment from Monique Smalls.

Texas head coach Gail Goestenkors got a verbal commitment for her Longhorns this week as well. Lauren Flores from Houston’s North Shore High School verbally committed to Texas this week had offers from Baylor and Texas A&M as well.

In total this makes six juniors already committing to Division I schools in Texas with Baylor collecting three in addition to Texas and Texas Tech’s lot.

Rankings Buzz
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel released its updated Top 10 for Wisconsin this week. The top six teams remain unchanged with 12-0 Kimberly still No. 1 overall, followed by Janesville Parker, De Pere, and Milwaukee King, all with one loss.

Closing out the top 10 are Milwaukee Vincent (9-2), Grafton (13-0), Oak Creek (12-1), Ripon (13-0), Delavan-Darien (14-0) and Arrowhead (13-1). Oak Creek and Arrowhead are the new names in the state rankings, both were not ranked previously. Oak Creek is coming off a 56-46 win over Franklin and moves up to No. 4 in the Milwaukee-area rankings.

Notes
Alicia Seelaus, a junior forward at River Hill High School in Clarksville, Md., was named the Girl’s Athlete of the Week by the Baltimore Sun for her play in the Queen Anne Tournament in Queen Anne County, Md. She led her No. 15 ranked Hawks to the championship and scored 45 points in the three-game event and averaged 10 rebounds per game. … Jackson High School in Mill Creek, Wash., is amidst a fantastic sibling rivalry behind senior guard Kristi Kingma and her younger brother, freshman guard Brett Kingma. Both lead their respective teams in scoring, Kristi now atop the Seattle-area 4A schools with 22.0 points per game and Brette 17.3 points per game. Both are credited with their great shooting ability. Kristi leads in average, but Brett had the high score for the season at 33, just one point ahead of his big sister, who signed a letter of intent to play for Washington.


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Chris Hansen

Chris Hansen is the National Director of Scouting for Women’s Basketball at HoopGurlz.com. He leads the panel that evaluates and ranks girl's basketball prospects nationally for HoopGurlz. Chris has been involved in the women’s basketball community since 1998 as a coach, trainer, evaluator and reporter. He can be reached at chris@hoopgurlz.com.

Related Players

LaSondra Barrett
Lauren Flores
Mary Bokenkamp
Kristi Kingma

Related Schools

LSU
Texas
Texas Tech

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