CHHS will play Apex HS tomorrow at 7pm at Koskinen Stadium at Duke University.

 Good luck!!!!!

The team is gearing up for the NC High School Lacrosse Championship on Saturday at Koskinen Stadium at Duke University.  The Cougars will take on the Chapel Hill High Tigers for the State title and the match up will start at 7pm.

 I had a chance to catch up with the team captains today.  My hosts on campus included Coach John Hayden; senior Joe Nugent, who is headed to UNCW next year with hopes to play club lacrosse; and Parker Wilson, who will play D-1 lacrosse at Sacred Heart University in Conneticut next season.  Check out the video below for their analysis of the team this season.

Joe Winston, a Social Worker at Carver Living Center organized the tournament complete with food and a raffle to raise money for the Alzheimer’s Association.  The two teams that competed were from Grace Healthcare and Carver Living Center.

Carver was the winner of the tournament and together the two groups raised over $200.

Check out the video to see the team members and why they put on the tournament!

 Two of the guys that will be in the draft are from NC and played at ACC schools….

Dre Moore was a DT at MD for the past four years, but he is actually from Charlotte NC. 

DeMario Pressley is someone the triangle has seen a lot of the past four years as a DT at NCState, but his hometown is just down the road in Greensboro.

Good luck to the NC guys tomorrow. 

And if you want to study up before it all gets under way at 3pm or just see some of the highlights there is more video of the top 200 players that are elidgible for the draft on SI.com…check it out.

After this weekend and the football spring games, it makes this all worse.  Even Marcus and his ACC Football Report has gone on hiatus until June.  So I’ve started a countdown.  127 days until the fall season kicks off on August 28th.

But in the mean time, I’m glad that some NC schools decided to have their spring games since most other schools have already played.  UNC’s got canceled so we have to wait until the fall to see the dazzling technique of Butch and his boys.  I had a hard time deciding which one to go to with Duke, State and Wake all playing last Saturday.  I think that the cure all would be to just have each spring game on a different weekend in April for all of the NC teams.  That way everyone who is going through withdrawal will have four solid weekends of college football to tide them over until next August.

BUT my synopsis of the status of the three ACC teams after last weekend would be:

Duke tried everything to get fans there.  They gave away free food, they had a band and David Cutcliffe did everything in his power short of sacrificing a ram to get people out there.  I don’t know anyone who went, but I do know that the team has lost a combined 400+ lbs before the spring game just getting into shape.  We’ll see how the season will shape up but it sounds like Cutcliffe has done everything in his power to motivate his team.

Oh man, State.  They had the opposite problem that Duke had, with 14000+ fans in attendance.  The biggest thing I was hoping to see from this game was a solution to the QB problem they’ve had ever since #17 moved on to the Chargers.  We have seen Evans at work for 2 seasons so I hope his shoulder gets better after surgery but I really wanted to see Burke, Wilson, and Beck in action.  I have just read over the highlights (or lack there of) from the scrimmage but from the sounds of it, I sure hope the Mike Glennon is the secret weapon that State needs and his recruiting class can turn the whole team around…summer can’t be long enough for them as they are still trying to regroup.

I actually went to the Wake game Saturday.  Call me crazy, but I didn’t really want to go sit through State’s scrimmage and see exactly what I saw last year at the State/MD game…minus Darrell Blackman and Demario Pressley…Skinner is looking better than ever (and even more to some people who saw his photo shoot online earlier this year)….Hodges and McManis looked decent.  The offense spent more time on the field, and I really didn’t see many of the first string D play, so I’m gonna hope that means that they are ready.  Grobe kept his low profile in his old ragged sweatshirt and hat, and blended in with the crowd.  The basketball team was in attendance, and several other players who are elidgible for the draft were in attendance after finishing out their 2007 with the Deacs, including John Tereshinski.

So until these next 127 days are over I will be on the message boards for scout.com trying to squeeze every dollar out of my subscription to the Premium Football page of PackPride.  And watching the highlights for all of the recruits for ‘09.

The Dunk and 3 point Contest is held every spring and select seniors are invited who are not tied up with post season tournament final rounds.  There were 7 seniors who participated, and each had a chance to show 2 dunks in the first round.  The top 4 competed for the title.  The judges for the competition were David Robinson, Emmit Smith and Kellen Winslow Jr.

Washington’s 360 dunk is below.  This was his first dunk of the contest and didn’t get as much love as it should have.  It is more impressive in slow motion than it was in real time.  Washington finished in 6th place, but that finish does not represent his true talent.  He is an amazing athlete and will be a great forward in the NBA.  I see him going more as late in the first round of the draft, even beginning of second round.

Gist’s dunk is not on youtube from last week,  but I put a dunk below from regular season.  He finished in the top 4 for the dunk contest.  He is a strong candidate for the draft and will definitely go in the first round.

The winner was Sonny Weems from Arkansas.  I think his most impressive dunk is the one below.

Don’t worry if you missed the contest.  They have shown it all weekend, and I am sure that they will continue showing it.

Stephen Curry has shown his true colors in the tournament and has been shooting 49% and 45% from the 3 pt line.  The kid is a baller and has averaged over 30 ppg in the past 3 post season games.

Curry is originally from Charlotte and his dad was Dell Curry, who played at Virginia Tech in school and went on to play for the Charlotte Hornets.  He is currently the Director of Basketball Relations for the Bobcats.  Both of the Curry men are not the only atheletes in the family.  Stephen’s mom, Sonya Curry, played volleyball at VTech.  His younger brother, Seth, currently plays basketball at Charlotte Christian and will be playing at Liberty next year.  To see how big of a fan he is of his older brother, check out WCNC’s interview with Seth Curry from yesterday.

Tony Kornheiser talked to Stephen on Monday on PTI and even asked about his feelings towards Virginia Tech and if any of the ACC teams have expressed regret after not recruiting him.  Check it out-

Since the NCAA won’t let highlights be shown if a game in that tournament is still in progress.  With the help of his little girl’s dolls he gave the play by play.  Several other blogs have posted the highlights including ACC Nation and AOL Fanhouse and even the boards like Scout’s PackPride.com.

Check out some of the highlights:

The front of Deacon Tower underconstruction.  This is the side people will see when the come into the parking lot/stadium and the view from Deacon Blvd.

This is the view from inside of the stadium.  They are starting to tear out the bleachers in the middle section to put up black folding seats.

Can you believe the progress?  It looked smaller than NC State’s Vaughn Towers which were finished before the 2005 season, to me.  But it seems like Vaughn Towers doesn’t have any of their operations below the stands, and Deacon Towers starts down below.  It is set to be ready for the home opener this season on Sept 6 vs. Mississippi.  And the final product should be more like this:

For more pics of what it is supposed to look like check out the master plan.

 Even though I have still into the NCAA tourney (dispite what you may think since none of my teams are still playing), I started thinking about the competition.  If the ACC had one of their own Slam Dunk Competitions for everyone (not just the seniors), here is how I would expect it to play out:

UVA and BC would have to forfeit.  (It’s cool guys, just call it a season and hit the recruiting trail for 2009.)    Anthony King could rep Miami, but his highlights on youtube are not as spectacular. Other honorable mentions include: Jason Rich (FSU), and Alex Stepheson (UNC). With someone from each of the rest of the ACC represented they would rank below-

Jermis Smith (GT) 

Demarcus Nelson (Dook)

 Gavin Grant (NC State)

Then there would be a log jam at the top for:
James Mays (Clemson)

LD Williams (WF)

Bombale Osby (MD)

And the Winner would be-Deron Washington (VaTech), who might actually be in the contest this year, since he is a senior. And if he is, we know the ACC will be well represented.