SGV/Whittier Prep Sports Zone: Escarcega on Preps: Ready or Not - "California Live" Is Set to Make History
Area basketball teams will be part of this showcase event that is sanctioned by the CIF.
Damien High School will be part of California Live this weekend. (Escarcega)
History is about to be made this weekend and for anyone that is a current stakeholder in basketball, many are anxious to see how all of this will be played out.
For the first time in state history, there will be a high school basketball showcase event for both the boys and girls basketball players. The event is called California Live, and it will be taking place at several high school gymnasiums in Orange County. The girls will also be having a similar event in Northern California.
The sites that will be hosting events in Orange County include Beckman HS, Crean Lutheran HS, Estancia HS, Irvine HS, Laguna Hills HS, Mission Viejo HS, Tustin HS, and Woodbridge HS. The event is being hosted by the Southern California Interscholastic Basketball Coaches Association (SCIBCA) and will be streamed live by Baller TV.
The immediate goal for this event is for players to showcase their skills in front of college coaches from a variety of levels (Division 1 to NAIA) in the hopes of earning either significant financial aid or to earn a scholarship offer.
This event is the answer to the popular Section 7 college showcasing event that will be taking place next weekend at State Farm Stadium in Glendale Arizona.
When we broke the news that the CIF State Office was going to sanction this event last year, the great majority of people were welcoming the news. However, there was significant dissent from many people on Twitter.
Chris Teevan, the head coach at Modesto Christian HS, tweeted “Please let (Arizona) continue to do a Section 7 for boys and let California to do their won for the girls.”
A person that runs the Beach City Hoops Twitter account posted, “I hope I’m wrong, but I really don’t think this is gonna go as smoothly.
Former high school coach Ryan Moore tweeted, “It will be a disaster.”
Matt Dunn, who was the former basketball coach at Damien High School and is the current coach at St. John Bosco, is part of the SCIBCA committee that is running the event. He knows that with over 100 teams competing this weekend, there could be some bumps in the road, but he has hopes that this event will grow down the line.
“Only 40 schools from California got invited to Section 7 next week and we were one of the schools,” Dunn said. “With our tournament this week, everything kept within the state, and we got 140 schools that are going to be a part of it. We’ve put a lot of work into it and the hope is that it is successful.”
With the event poised to get started on Friday, many area coaches are not only endorsing it, but they are also embracing it. Among the area teams that will be participating this weekend includes Arcadia, Blair, Bonita, Bosco Tech, Damien, Diamond Bar, Glendora, La Mirada, Maranatha, Pasadena, St. Francis, and St. Paul.
Julien Gomez of La Mirada will be one of the featured players at the CA Live showcase event this weekend. (Escarcega)
“CA Live is a great opportunity for California team to get collegiate exposure,” La Mirada coach Randy Orodoz said, who coaches one of the premier guards in Southern California in Julian Gomez. “Some kids have an opportunity to play in front of college coaches with more structure from your high school team than you might get with your AAU team. I’m sure that as the years go on, CA Live will only continue to get better.”
Don Bosco Tech boys basketball coach Michael Romo added, “To be part of this inaugural tournament is an absolute honor for us. We look forward to competing against some of the best teams in the state.”
South Pasadena coach Ernest Baskerville, who is one of the coaches that enjoy putting on basketball events during the season as well as in the off-season, is just as excited as anyone to be part of this historic event.
“It is a huge opportunity to be recognized on a larger scale and play with many of the best schools in California,” Baskerville said. “Our student-athletes are looking forward to showcasing their talents in front of the NCAA coaches in attendance.”
The college basketball community appears to have also embraced this event. As of Wednesday morning, 49 college programs (Dunn estimates 200 college coaches will be in attendance) have requested event credentials for the weekend. Among them are Arizona St and Colorado from the Pac-12, the ACC’s Virginia, West Coast Conference’s Gonzaga, St. Mary’s and Loyola Marymount, and other programs including Fresno State, San Diego State, Sacramento State, Long Beach State, UC Irvine, Nevada, UC San Diego, and Cal Lutheran (coached by former state winning basketball coach Russell White).
St. Francis coach Todd Wolfson: “I hope this is a great event. I know that the SCIBCA does a great job every year, so I’m not worried about that. My only concern is that those college coaches only appear at the upper division games and don’t trickle to down event sites like where we are playing.”
Dunn understands Wolfson’s concerns. “We can’t control where the coaches are going, but I can tell you that we’ve done a lot of work such as to make sure that games are staggered so that coaches can watch players in action. This is a unique opportunity for many players to get exposure and that’s important because recruiting right now is terrible because of the transfer portal.”
There has been a misconception that is a money-grabbing event. Troy Dorsey, the head coach at Apollo High School in Arizona tweeted that he felt it was a “money move.”
According to Dunn – that is further from the truth. “First off, the NCAA sets the prices for the event,” Dunn said (admission costs will be $10). “It’s the cheapest tournament out there this summer – so who’s making the money? The schools that we are holding our games at are not charging us anything, and we will be giving them a donation at the end of the event. People who say that don’t understand the situation.”
There is a legitimate issue when it comes to this event and that is the fact that many teams couldn’t participate this weekend because they are in their “dead period,” as mandated by the CIF Southern Section. Both Dunn and Wolfson agree this rule needs to be either eliminated or modified.
“I hope that CIF changes this rule,” Dunn said. “To put everyone under the same umbrella with the same time period is very challenging. It also hurts the student-athlete also.”
Dunn points out that there are only two weekends that an event like this can take place via the NCAA. It is this weekend and next weekend. (From Friday at noon to Sunday at 5:00 p.m.).
“I think that is great but there has to be a change to the dead period rule and I’m not the only one who believes this,” Wolfson said. “Something needs to be done to fix the dead period because it is not working for many programs that are not participating in this event that wants to be a part of it. It presents some tough conversations for those coaches and the parents that have kids within the program.”
And while the hope within the CIF State office is to rotate it every year between Northern California and Southern California, it is the hope of many coaches in Southern California that it is kept in Southern California.
For now, basketball insiders and college coaches will be out and about this weekend, looking at some of the best talent on the west coast… which for student-athletes is a win. After all, all they are asking is “a chip and a chance.”
Here is the link to schedule where games will be played at this weekend.