Pitchin with Pritch: Basketball showcase gives kids exposure

A basketball event is coming to Grant May 29-30, when the Midwest Boys and Girl’s Elite College Showcase comes to town. 

This event is a very new event with a former player at Nebraska being the provider of the idea and the development of the event. 

It is primarily designed for Western Nebraska boys and girls that have some skills and want to improve those skills and at the same time have some college and university coaches take a look at the talent that shows up for this event. 

The event is organized by a former Husker basketball player Steffon Bradford. 

Bradford is a former basketball player at Lincoln who played for the Huskers after playing two years of junior college ball. 

Bradford played one year for Danny Nee and when Nee left the program, he played his senior year for Barry Collier. 

Bradford grew up in Florida and played junior college basketball in California before becoming a Husker. At Nebraska, he averaged 12 points per game, eight rebounds, and hit 55.5% of his shots.

 He also came to love the state too. 

He was quoted in the World- Herald saying, “I tell people straightforward, man, Nebraska is one of the best places to live. The people are kind. You need to come here.” 

Bradford went on to play professional basketball, mostly overseas. 

He played for 21 years. He still works out and at 6’6’, 240 pounds he can still play the game and is training to play in 3-on-3 contests. He is also the head boys coach at Brownell-Talbot.

This event is mainly for players in the west but anyone can come. There will be drills and skills worked on and then some tournament scrimmage work. 

Then, on Sunday, there will be an All-Star game I get to coach one team in that part of the event.  

I was told there are 20 players coming from Los Angles for this event. 

I told Coach Bradford that I hoped the LA kids don’t die of culture shock when they come here.

 It might be a little bit strange to have a bunch of friendly people that enjoy basketball being here to watch. We might just have to see if they show up. 

That seems a long way away for a two-day basketball workout, but time will tell.

There won’t be Division I coaches here because of NCAA rules, but Division II, III and junior colleges can attend.

 Some of the colleges that have indicated they would be here are Peru State, Oakland City University, Southeastern Baptist College, Johnson University, Tennessee Wesleyan University, Wilberforce University, Cumberland University, Cheyney State University, Presentation College and Shawnee State. Shawnee State was the Champion of the NAIA schools this year.

BBALL transfer portal

Ted Allen is moving to his fifth college next year as he is going to New Mexico State. 

The NCAA most likely will not give him a waiver on this one and he would have to sit out a year in order to become eligible. 

Another player Akol Arop is heading back to his home in Omaha and will play for UNO. 

The transfer portal keeps pretty busy just with players coming to Husker and players leaving the Huskers. 

I would bet that transfer rule is getting talked about a lot by the powers that be in the NCAA.