We lost our first game! we played horrible... I mean HORRIBLE!!! OK here comes the excuses... refs wouldn't call a foul when we were getting the girls checking us with 2 hands at the same time and pushing us to the point where we were getting knocked down... we beat this team by 20 points 2 months ago by pressing and passing the ball and tonight we NEVER pressed and we didn't pass... we forced shots on double and triple team situations... they had a game plan and we let them run all over us! I HATE LOSING!!!! Landmark you totally out played us... great coaching & amazing playing... you beat us & deserved to win! I wish we could play one more time!!! I REFUSE TO LOSE ANOTHER GAME THIS SEASON!
BRAGGIN RIGHTS TOURNAMENT
BRAGGIN RIGHTS TOURNAMENT… We won both games! Everybody played well and we had a great time. Met Vince Rush, he is a sports photographer in Cincinnati. He took pictures during our 2 games and they were incredible!!! Also met Mark Lewis from HoopGurlz, he was so nice and talked to me for quite awhile. He told Ed Hackney, Vince Rush and my dad some really nice things about me and told my dad he wants routine updated about me. Talk to some college coaches I know… 2 more years and I can’t…
ALMOST CHRISTMAS
MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYBODY, 5 days early!!!! It has been one of the best years of my life! GREAT FRIENDS... GREAT SCHOOL... GREAT SEASON!!!! We are still undefeated! Andrea Hoover, THANK YOU SO MUCH for wanting me to go to school here and I LOVE playing basketball with you and the SVA team! I THANK GOD every day for the way he has blessed my life with great parents, friends, coaches, trainers, teachers and mentors! We still have to play Dayton Dunbar and Villa Angela-St Joseph (Melvin Levett's old high school), then Stivers and CJ before heading to the Texas Seventh Day Adventist National Tournament in January 10th.
PLAYER OF THE WEEK - MAXPREP
I can't believe it, I won Player of the Week on Maxpreps for my school... Congratulations to Celina King for being selected as Player of the Week. Celina King drained 7 of 11 three point attempts and scored 27 points in helping Spring Valley Academy Stallions defeat the Sydney Christian Academy Eagles 58-29. In addition to her season high point total, she grabbed 6 rebounds and had 5 steals. With her performance on Tuesday, Celina is averaging 14.3 points per game on the season.
KETTERING ROUNDBALL CLASSIC
We won the Kettering Roundball Classic and went undefeated! Everybody on our SVA team played great, Andrea, Shannon and myself all made the All Star Team! My AAU teammate and good friend Rachael Young from Landmark (she will be playing college ball next year) also made the team along with Casey Lao from VGA from Texas. Rachael & Casey I love you guys! The tournament was so much fun and we really played well as a team. We did a big fund raiser for the tournament for a charity and had the high school boy fly in to speak at the event. I meet him and he's from Arizona, he started this amazing outreach ministry in Africa to help orphans that parents have died from HIV/AIDS... his name is Austin Gutwein and he is a ROLE MODEL to me...he's really not a good basketball player or a boy that you would think could do anything BIG, but he is AMAZING! He is making a difference in the world... visitwww.HoopsofHope.org and please donate!!! It sure makes all the time I spend on basketball seem pretty selfish! I want to talk with him about what I have been wanting to start... If anybody would understand me he would... he made his dream a reality... and he is changing the world! Please pray for me to have the guts to do what I need to do. I know basketball is the key to make it work with God's help and help from a bunch of great people I have meet through basketball!
SCRIMMAGE
NOV 17, 2010 My dad set us up to scrimmage with Finneytown, Lockland and Winton Woods High Schools. We played AMAZING... My dad got us invited to The Braggin Rights Tournament... how exciting is that!
COACH CARLTON GRAY
Our team practices are fun, but I can already tell that I'm going have to continue with my normal everyday workouts to keep getting better and stronger. Carlton Gray is working me out daily, either in private or group sessions... I am learning so much from Carlton... THANK YOU CARLTON... I LOVE YOU & THANK YOU FOR EVERYTHING! I really feel my game is improving and he keeps forcing me out of my COMFORT ZONE... see Carlton, I really do listen!
OHIO ACHIEVEMENT TEST
I'm still being home schooled and my dad is my learning coach. I honestly love doing the one-on-one learning with him. I just did my Ohio Testing and my scores place me in the MIDDLE FOR OHIO 10th GRADERS... not bad for a 7th grader! My dad always says it really isn't fair because I get to learn so much more than other kids because it's just the two of us and not a class of 30 kids! My dad really does make it fun and I love when I get perfect scores on my online tests. My parents ALWAYS say "basketball has a short shelf life & it could end any day... education is what will carry you the rest of your life". More than basketball, I want to be smart and do something to make a difference in the world! I badly want to start a charity work where I can use basketball to help get money for a needy group (I tell you more later... I really feel God has put something in my heart to do this).
ENROLL AT SPRING VALLEY ACADEMY
After a lot of thought, I decided to take a class at Spring Valley Academy in Centerville, Ohio and play basketball for their Varsity High School team. I am the youngest player ever to play Varsity and I'm so excited to have earned the Starting Point Guard slot. My teammate is one of the biggest reasons for me attending SVA, Andrea Hoover. I played against her earlier this year and we talked on the phone about the school and the team. Andrea will be playing for the University of Dayton next year... how exciting is that me a 12 year old 7th grader starting with a D1 stud like Andrea! SVA is not a member school of OHSAA and so my dad talked with the lady in charge to make sure it wouldn't hurt me playing my normal 4 varsity years if I later attended a OHSAA school. So, it looks like I will get 6 years of varsity playin!!! I actually played for a homeschool team last year and played some varsity high school teams.
IMMACULATA COLLEGE CATHY RUSH CAMP
Cathy Rush Camp
Got to meet the woman that started NCAA Women’s Basketball. Cathy Rush started it all back in 1970 at Immaculata College in PA with a school with less than 500 students. She won 3 National Championships and went to the Final Four 5 years in a row! After the NCAA Title 9 made scholarships equal and available to female athletes, the big schools took over and Immaculata just could compete with the UT and others.
It was an amazing camp, I played with the high school girls and did really well. The coaches were so smart and nice… everybody really wanted to be there and they really cared about us. I met the first women to ever score a point in USA Women’s Olympics history. Her name is Juliene Brazinski Simpson and she also was University of Cincinnati head coach in the past. She was so nice and we are sending her some Skyline Chili!!! She also was Ann Meyers roommate… I know her! It was 5 days of learning and fun… I got the only trophy given out, for the 2010 Basketball Camper Award and received a scholarship! Cathy Rush gave me a special gift of a hat from when she was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame along with a T-shirt. She was the one coach I really wanted to meet… we even visited Immaculata University while we were there. It was beautiful and I got some neat stuff while I was there.
AAU 13U NATIONALS..... NO REST FROM OGBR
NO REST FROM OGBR
Was invited to play up with The Northern Kentucky Lady Tigers (the pink team) in the AAU 13U Nationals. I love these girls, even though they beat us everytime we played them! Coach’s daughter, Elly is so good and so are the other girls. Coach Mark really likes me because he said I have great energy and I’m not afraid of anybody. We lost to the team that came in 3rd place in the nation; by 1 lousy basket… we had them beat with under half a minute to go. I still had a great time and it was an amazing experience… THANK you Coach and all the girls for letting me play!!!
OGBR
Thank you Tom Jenkins for asking me to participate even though I was too young! Now I know what HOT really is… It was almost 100 every single day and the gyms and dorms had NO A/C !!! Our day started at 6am and our last game didn’t end until after 10pm. I learned so much and played against some amazing players. I had some really good games, but one game I let an older girl pick me twice on a weak crossover… I was so mad… after it happened all I could hear in my head was Coach Dante saying PRIVIATE PROPERITY!!!! I so badly wanted to play that girl again. It really makes you see were you need to improve your game. THANK YOU TO ALL MY COACHES!!
JUSTIN BEIBER CONCERT
Justin Beiber Concert
Thank you Alysha for going with me to the concert. She even had to admit it was AMAZING! He is sooooooo cute! Our seats were really close....
12TH BIRTHDAY
It was the GREAT birthday!!!!! I got a huge poster with my name on a Xavier jersey hanging in the XU locker room and it was signed by all the guys players and coaches and all the girls players and coaches!
Papa Joe and Mama Bernie and my parents got me KILLER tickets to see.....the best looking singer in the world... oh yeah... Justin Beiber!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Coach Mark Trakh, the former coach of USC texted me a cool happy birthday message and then sent me another message, saying don't verbal anywhere until I become a head coach again.
He is assistant coach at San Diego State next year and the following year will be a head coach at another school. Coach Mark is the GREATEST!!!!!!
BASKETBALL SKILL ACADEMY
My dad just started BSA with trainers Dante Harlan, Carlton Gray and Melvin Levett. So many great ball players are at my place EVERYDAY! A lot of college players will be here all summer along with some of the top high school players. I have been working out with a bunch of high school starters and D1 college players everyday… I love it!
AAU SEASON - TOREROS
Our season started off a little rough with team chemistry issues. I had so much fun the second half of the season. My dad starting coaching and we went on a 12 game winning streak. We were gelling and playing like a team. We won first place in our league and played several tourneys.
After our season ended, I helped out BCK and played for Coach Jacob. The girls were really nice and I played with them for AAU State champions. Karri is so funny and nice, I hope I see you over the summer!
2010 NCAA TOURNEY
My Xavier ladies team was AMAZING! They were 5th in the nation and were a fraction of a second away from the Final Four! Like my dad says, it was not any one player’s fault they lost, it was a team effort. No one play cost you the game, it’s a whole series of plays throughout the game. There is always enough blame to go around! What a year, Kate Rutan broke the 3 point scoring record at XU. It was the highest XU has ever been raked. The team was so good and probably the only team in NCAA that had a chance of giving UCONN a real game.
UCONN is the team I’m rooting for since my girls are gone. They are so strong in every position and Coach Geno is the best… he knows how to get the best girls and makes them even better. I know Mel Thomas loved playing for him. I will continue to work hard and see what he thinks about me. A lot of my friend’s dads don’t like UCONN, but I know that everybody hates a dynasty and wants them to lose. Not me, they are a basketball machine… they do everything right!
UCONN WINS... another PERFECT season!!!!!!!
HOME SCHOOL BASKETBALL NATIONALS - SPRINGFIELD, MO
Played for the Cincinnati Trailblazers and we had fun and came in I believe 16th in the nation. The guys team played amazing and I think came in 6th in the nation.
While we were in Springfield, MO I was so excited to workout with someone I had always wanted to meet, Jackie Stiles the NCAA All-Time Scoring Leader & WNBA ROY 2001!
She holds about every record in NCAA scoring. She had 41 points in the final four against Duke, I have the video… she is soooo good. It is hard to believe how she took it to the basket against huge players when she is so small. She is still tiny and really pretty… but still a baller!
I had so much fun meeting her and training with her twice. Her entire Olympic used uniform she signed for me and it hangs in our gym. Along with SMS practice jersey, shoes and her final game wore jersey from New Zealand. THANK YOU Jackie for EVERYTHING!
CLASSIC IN THE COUNTRY
My Dad, Mom and I went to Berlin, OH for Classic in the Country. It was real fun. I got to watch a lot of games from teams everywhere in Ohio, New Jersey and even Florida. I was so glad that it wasn’t 12 degrees below like last year.
KENDALL’S FIRST GAME!
I rode up with Kendall’s parents Ed and Carol and Tommy McBride (Tia’s dad, she plays for the Georgetown Hoyas). Ed and Tommy were nonstop talking, while Carol and I watch movies! My dad says I’m the luckiest kid on the planet to have so many amazing people really care about me! I know he is right!!! I really do thank God for everybody!
Kendall is so good and Northwestern played GREAT and beat Toledo. She played a ton and scored 14 points and got lots of boards. I met Coach Joe, he was so nice and asked me questions about the game and about basketball. He is a really cool guy and so are his assistants.
I rode home with Ed and Carol and spent the night in Kendall’s bed. I had a great time, Ed and I went to a pancake breakfast and I saw some people I knew from basketball. Thank you for letting we spend the night… it was great!
Tommy McBride rode back with my dad and mom. Dad said they talked about everything. I can tell my dad really likes Tommy, he said he’s a good man with a huge heart!