By Inglewood Today Sports Wire
The California high school basketball season was just a few days from completion with the coronavirus pandemic began bulldozing through the nation, dooming sports events to suspension and or cancellation.
Among the local post-season basketball events that became a casualty because of sweeping federal and state regulations was the 22nd annual Collision All Star Games scheduled for April 18th at Los Angeles Harbor College.
The even annually features the top-graduating seniors, pitting the CIF-Southern Section against the Los Angeles City Section in a girls and boys doubleheader.
Many of the participants for the event had been chosen and committed, waiting with abated breath to close out their high school careers, but the novel coronavirus muted those aspirations.
“It has been a very difficult time for everyone,” Collision All Star Game founder and Director Kenneth Miller said in a statement. “Like many other and more prominent events such as the NBA, MLB, NCAA establishing the unprecedented course of action to suspend or cancel, it essentially took my decision out of my hands. While sports has offered our nation an avenue to heal in many instances, this crisis is so monumental that we all need to do our part and follow the state and federal guidelines for as long as possible to save lives.”
The coaches names for the event were: Southern Section coaches consisted of (girls) Megan Kelso of Chaminade High School and Reggie Howard of Ribet Academy; City coaches selected were (girls) Sherland Chensam of Hamilton High School and Lloyd Webster of King Drew High School.
The girl’s game would have featured All CIF Southern Section selections Ashkee Lewis of Long Beach Poly, Chaminade’s Alexis Whitfield and Ugonne Onyian, Fairmont Prep’s Kaitlyn.
City girls would have included Ariana Grimes of Westchester and many other outstanding City performers.
Girls Mythical MVP– Alexis Whitfield, arguably among the most dominant players in the state who dueled Redondo Union’s Anna Johnson in one of the most exciting high schools games I’ve ever seen scoring 41 points. I have no doubt that she would have been outstanding for the Southern Section Girls squad.
Among the standout boys performers slated to play, the top selections were All CIF Selections J Serra’s Ian Martinez, Ribet Academy’s Snookie Wigington, Rolling Hills Prep JT Tan, St Pius X/St. Mathais Rafel Gomez, Fairmont Prep’s Atin Wright, Etwanda’s Jaylen Clark and Cameron Pierce.
Key City selections included King Drew’s Fidelis Okereke, Fairfax’s Keith Dinwiddie, Washington Prep’s Deshawn Johnson, El Camino Real’s Benjamin Todd, Westchester’s Ky-mani Pollard and Marland Harris.
Boys Mythical MVP: Ian Martinez, the Utah signee guided J Serra to the brink of a sectional title during an injury-plagued season. He had committed to play in the event since his sophomore season and there is no question that he would have dominated Collision like he did his many other opponents on his way to a stellar campaign.
