As Eris Winder approached the free-throw line with 18 seconds left in his team’s game against Durango Tuesday, the Palo Verde senior leaned his head back and yawned for a quick moment. Winder scored 23 of his 24 points in the second half against Legacy, enabling Palo Verde to overcome an 18-point halftime deficit to win 63-59 in the first round of the Sunset Regional playoffs.
An uninitiated pair of eyes may have found it difficult to determine which player was the nation’s top-ranked recruit in Bishop Gorman’s 73-43 regional semifinal victory over Legacy on Thursday. Even with Shabazz Muhammad putting on his typical outstanding performance, Gorman teammate Demetris Morant stole a significant amount of attention from the crowd at the Desert Oasis High gym.
Legacy High’s Zach Lane scored 25 points and Cardon Harris added 24 points Wednesday to lead the host Longhorns to a 101-82 victory against Durango in the Sunset Regional quarterfinals for the school’s first playoff win
The following sentence could apply to about half of Bishop Gorman’s games this season: Junior guard Shabazz Muhammad shined while (insert high-profile college coach here) watched from the stands. It was no different in Gorman’s 101-64 beatdown of Legacy on Tuesday in the first round of the Sunset Region playoffs. Muhammad scored 32 points and made his first seven 3-point attempts in front of Kansas coach Bill Self, who was in town to watch one of the nation’s top recruits in the class of 2012.