Thursday, April 17, 2008

The Tyreke Show

By almost any measure, Tyreke Evans is one of the best high school basketball players in the country.

There are no shortage of experts who will tell you he is THE best player.

And he has the numbers to prove it, including being named best player in Pennsylvania by the Associated Press.

The 6-6 guard from American Christian has racked up some gaudy numbers in his impressive career. He averaged 29 points per game, and has become a familiar figure in the post-season All-Star games, including the McDonald’s Classic, which draws the cream of the high school crop from all across the country. Evans was named the game’s MVP. He was prominently featured on the Parade Magazine All-America team.

So it was only natural there has been great interest in where Evans will attend school. He was believed to be considering Villanova, Memphis and Texas, among others.

Such is Evans’ stature that several national media outlets beat a path to the small school in Aston where Evans announced he would join John Calipari’s Memphis program. ESPNU carried the press conference live.

Of course, the Daily Times also made the trip out to Aston to cover the press conference. It was a big story. We had every intention of giving it big coverage.

We reported about Evans’ choice in today’s print edition. We’re fairly confident in our reporting of Evans’ decision. But we didn’t hear it from his own mouth. That’s because we weren’t allowed in.

A decision was made by the school and family to deny us admission to the press conference. They apparently are upset by some of our coverage of the program, some off-the-court issues in which Tyreke has been involved, and the fact that Evans was not selected as the Daily Times Player of the Year. He was named to the All-Delco team. The Player of the Year honor went to Karon Burton, who led the Chester Clippers to the state title.

I don’t take part in the selection process of our All-Delco teams. I leave that to the more knowledgeable folks who work in our sports deparments. I can tell you this, however. There is rarely an All-Delco team selected that I do not receive phone calls complaining about our choices.

I wish Tyreke Evans nothing but the best in his college career. I have no doubt that one day we will be seeing him flash his brilliant talent in the NBA.

I just wish we could have seen him taking one of his last actions as a high schooler.

1 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

You guys really blew it by not covering this kid. It's almost criminal how you kept this kid's talent in the dark. Hidden and basically unknown to most Delco residents. It's sad. And that was before the "incident" which led to articles like "HIDE AND SEEK". You guys are haters, I wouldn't have let you in either.

April 17, 2008 1:10 PM 

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