LIKE IT IS : Real Deal, Old School events loaded with talent

WALLY HALL

Posted on Thursday, April 17, 2008

URL: http://www.wholehogsports.com/adg/223029/

It isn’t so much old school vs. new school, but the competition is there this weekend when Arkansas hosts not one but two spring basketball tournaments.

The Real Deal on the Hill, in its fourth year, has grown to become one of the largest and most prestigious tournaments in the country.

The brackets were filled with 270 teams last December, and there were 84 teams on the waiting list. With 90 more at the Old School Tournament on the beautiful campus of Central Arkansas in Conway, that’s 360 teams total.

The Real Deal will be played in Northwest Arkansas and will feature 102 of the top 150 players in the country.

The Old School Tournament in Conway will be much smaller, and the featured division will have eight teams.

Saturday is the first day coaches are allowed to evaluate potential players — although they cannot talk to them or the summer coaches — and Bill Ingram, founder of Real Deal on the Hill, said an all-star cast of college coaches has signed up for credentials to be in Northwest Arkansas.

“We’ve had more than 300 coaches register already, and there will be more on Friday. There always is,” Ingram said. “We’ve got some of the biggest names in college basketball going to be there, including Bill Self [coach of national champion Kansas ], Roy Williams [North Carolina ] and Rick Pitino [Louisville ]. To be honest with you, I could fill up your entire column with the names of coaches who are going to be there.”

Ingram and Ron Crawford, founder of the Old School Tournament and an officer with the AAU, have been involved in summer basketball for a long time and have traveled all over the country coaching.

Five years ago, Ingram started thinking about hosting his own tournament for three reasons: to show off his beautiful state, to raise money for the Arkansas Hawks (his basketball organization ) and save a few travel dollars.

The first year he had 82 teams, and it has grown every year since.

“I could not do this without the volunteers,” he said. “They are the greatest in the country.”

John Tyson, a huge basketball fan, was so impressed that he got involved as a sponsor to make sure the tournament would continue to develop.

Of the 102 top-rated players expected at the Real Deal, there are dozens who will be the center of attention for the top 30 major programs in the country, and two of those players are just ninth-graders.

LaQuinton Ross is a 6-7 forward who plays for MBA Hoops, and DeShawn Thomas is a 6-6 combo player for the Indy Spice Heat. He led the state of Indiana in scoring this past season and is being compared, fairly or not, to the Los Angeles Lakers’ Kobe Bryant.

All of the top-level players will have a chance to be showcased in Bud Walton Arena, and that certainly doesn’t hurt the Arkansas Razorbacks’ chances of landing some recruits, too.

Last year point guard Cortney Fortson made the first-team all-tournament team, and in November he signed to play with the Razorbacks. Sports Illustrated has him rated as the No. 7 player in the nation.

Arkansas Coach John Pelphrey has two, maybe three, scholarships left, so he and his staff will be very busy this weekend, but the good thing is they are at home.

Crawford, founder of the Arkansas Wings, has some top talent coming in for the Old School Tournament as well. Most play for Oklahoma Athletes First, but a few home-growns will have a chance to shine, too, guys such as Anson Bartlett, Alandis Lane and, of course, A. J. Walton.

At the Real Deal, locals such as Clarence Treat, Fred Gulley and others will draw attention from many of the coaches.

These may be competing tournaments, but the winners are the kids, who get a chance to play in front of so many coaches, and the state of Arkansas.