Henry Carr takes 6th place! Grennan named All Tournament!

We just got back to Toronto, and I thought I would post this article:

http://www2.tricities.com/tri/sports/high_school_prep/article/arbys_classic_carrs_mastery_over_big_eight_continues/38148/

Tournament Champion, Melrose High, the #1 team in Tennessee, defeated this same Science Hill squad by a score of 58-43 in the first round.

6'4" senior small forward Jahmal Grennan was named to the All Tournament team.

If anyone is interested, I may post some thoughts later on.

Happy New Year to one and all,

Coach Melnik

Great accomplishment Coach Melnik!. Your Crusaders seem to be getting things together (more noticeably in the fourth quarter!) I noticed Shane Reader got pretty hot in one of those games. Im going to keep saying he is one of the best guards in the province, don't sleep on him!

congratulations coach

It is worth celebrating. A win is a win and an accomplishment is an accomplishment. When Carr lost their first game, I thought Carr was not ready for this. However, as they started gettin their touch back, I realized the possible reasons for their loss.
Their loss came against a good team. But you have to understand the other team had home advantage. A team from Canada wont have supporters chearing for them on the very first game. That's what I think. Also, the other team may had the upper hand mentally since they didn't want an outsider to beat them. First game jitters, tierdness from travel, and nervousness could have caused the loss.
Nevertheless, they held strong and won the next 3 games.

Good Job Coach and Congrats to Your Team.

Hey TU20

Who cares if they are celebrating or not, how many coaches do you know in the GTA that take their teams away during the holiday season. I wish my school had a teacher like that.

Win by 20
Lose by 40
who cares if you are playing good competition you are getting better

Maybe that ranking is wrong they only lost by five to the number 1 ranked team in Tennessee.

Its that close that there are more than 4000 teams in between the number 1 team and a team they only beat by five?

That doesn't sound too plausible to me!

I agree with Coach C. Somethings got to be wrong with picture. The GTA has almost as much population as the entire state of Tennesee.

Also this is a big tournament.

So why would teams even consider entering if they were that weak?

Our lower level teams do not enter The Holiday Classic, The Crusader Classic, The St. Michael's Tournament, The Mother Teresa Invitational, The Rimrocker, etc.

So why would low-level teams from Tennessee enter perhaps their biggest high school tournament of the year? To get their doors blown off?

When I post scores/results on Hooptown, I am not asking for anyone to "celebrate", I am merely posting results. The Crusaders play a lot of games, and win or lose, those results are made public for everyone. I/we are not trying to boast nor are we trying to hide when we lose.

I want to thank those who posted messages of support. For those that seem to be trying to criticize this team, I am at a loss to understand your motivation. You are entitled to your opinion and this is a forum where you can broadcast it.

I am also curious where some of these supposed rankings originate. Maybe the authors can cite their sources? Also, as far as I know, the Fr Henry Carr Crusaders were the only Ontario team playing this week. That alone is something to be proud of. If it was so easy to do, then many others would be doing the same thing.

This tournament is very competitive. They are some very good teams like Melrose, Greater Atlanta Christian, New Rochelle, McEachern, etc, and there other teams that are not as highly ranked.

Regardless, most if not all these teams are well-coached. And on top of that, sometimes you will find yourself competing with some type of hometown officiating. For example, in the 6th place game versus Science Hill, we had a great start and took an early 15-2 lead I believe. We were a couple positive possessions from blowing that game wide open very early. However, several calls that were iffy allowed Science Hill to stay in the game.

Both Science Hill and Dobyns-Bennet (who we played in game 3) have won Tennessee State championships and are very solid programs.

Many observers at the tournament made a point to speak highly of our team. They all said that we got better as the week went on. Winning 3 games out of 4 on the road is a good accomplishment and I am proud of the way we closed out the tournament.

Coach Melnik

Coach, I have told you before and I will tell you again, no one can question the work you put into the FHC program you are on the right track; just get those boys ready for the second half of the season and make your results speak for themselves…

Great Job south of the boarder “coach!!!!”

I was wrong to quote a previous post without verifying. According to Max Prep, Science Hill is actually ranked 3819th in the U.S.

This just in...6'4" senior small forward Jahmal Grennan was named to the All Tournament team.

Congratulations Jahmal! You had a wonderful tournament. You have followed Curtis Trotter (All Tournament at the 2006 Beach Ball Classic and 2005 Arby's Classic) and Tramar Sutherland (All Tournament at the 2007 Arby's Classic) who also put in work at US tournaments.

Coach Melnik

Adding to Coach Melniks comment. I think when a GTA team or any other team from Canada goes down South to play, we should all come as one and support that team. We dont get to see many teams perform in US. Remember that they (in this case Carrr) not only represent their school but also Canada!
A US team and crowd wont mention Carr is from Martingrove and Finch (Toronto) but Carr is from Canada. Basically my point is instead of finding points to put down a team, we should all support their work.

IMO: And the mention of rankings is not to show Carr is weak or anything but to tell that the competition down South is tough. And in order for 'most' GTA teams to start playing at that level, our program needs to be strong. Personally, I feel our program doesnt have enough funds and our athletes are not well recognized. Our players doens't get enough games to play unlike most US teams where they have more league games and tournaments. Nevertheless, things are slowly changing. Thanks to Hooptown for providing a base for GTA athletes and coaches to come together. And thanks to people like Coach Melnik, who take basketball seriously and wants to see basketball rise much further in GTA and in Canada.

TAJ, the rankings you brought up in the other thread are relevant in gauging the level of competition of this tournament. Since you were the one to bring up the US National Rankings, a quick search revealed that this year's Arby's Tournament featured a weak field. There was only one team that was ranked top 100 in the field. This is no slight against Carr, but the reality is that they placed 6th in weak tournament.

US National Rankings of Teams in the 2009 Arby's TN Classic:
Melrose TN #31
Greater Atlanta Christian GA #130
Fayetteville AR #209
New Rochelle NY #311
Siegel TN #748
Sullivan East TN # 2921
Fairdale KY #2295
Tennessee High TN #3098
Dobyns-Bennet TN #3789
Science Hill TN #3819
Cherokee TN #3825
Miami Palmetto FL #3834
Brainerd TN #5455
Greeneville TN #12139

How many boys high school teams are there in the US?

Yes, the field looks weak and my point is not against Carr but our program. That is why I said we should support them rather them put them down. If our program cannot support then we should right? Just think about it, if the basektball program in GTA was strong, our athletes would be more mentally and physically competitive. And our level of game would be somewhat to the level of US teams. Again, these are all my opinion.
Carr went 3-1. They lost their first game and it is understandable since there could be lots of factors to the loss. Anyways it is a good accomplishment.

Melrose is #9 in the December 24th MaxPreps Writer's Poll. The only comparison I can make is that they beat Science Hill 58-43 and we beat Science Hill 70-56. Our record is now 22-3.

Competing with the top 25 US teams would be very difficult. I remember back in 1996 we (Runnymede) defeated Memphis East by 1 or 2 points at a tournament in Las Vegas. At that time, Memphis East was the #8 team in the US. My team today is on average 2 years younger than that Runnymede team.

And I saw you had Tyler and Tevin along for the experience making you younger still. I'm sure it was a great learning opportunity for both.

I imagine they would both have given you some decent minutes.

They were both wonderful additions to the team and had a blast. They really fit right in, and it shows that our team really is like a family. We also brought Kenrick for the trip, and wanted to bring Josh but he had a family commitment.

Congratulations Coach Melnik!! You know I am always proud of your young men, and appreciate the great work you put in with them. Keep doing what you are doing as you are obviously doing something right.

Happy New Year and God's bountiful blessings for you and yours in 2010!!!