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A blog on UConn women's basketball.

Tuesday, October 01, 2013

Wilson, Ekmark impress in all-star game

A'ja Wilson is expected to take an official visit
to UConn later this month according to her AAU coach
On Monday morning I was watching a replay of the Full Court Fresh 50 Invitational when a little thing like the news that UConn fired football coach Paul Pasqualoni made me put that project on hold.

I finally got around to watching the entire game, which was played on Sunday, so I could come up with unofficial numbers of how UConn commit Courtney Ekmark and recruiting target A'ja Wilson did in the game.

Again, these are just my unofficial numbers but I had Ekmark scoring 10 of her 14 points in the second half. She had three 3-pointers, five rebounds, three assists and a steal while Wilson had all nine of her points in the first half and added 18 rebounds, four assists and two blocked shots to lead the White team to a 101-64 win over the Blue.

What was interesting about the game is the the White team's head coach is Jerome Dickerson, who is Wilson's AAU coach and also coached former UConn guard Kalana Greene in AAU while the Blue team's coach was UConn Class of 2015 recruiting target Asia Durr's AAU coach.

I spoke to Dickerson earlier tonight to get his take on the performances by Ekmark and Wilson.

"She (Ekmark) can rebound, she can pass, she can dribble, she is a great player and a great teammate," Dickerson said.

"I have know A'ja since she was 12 years old and A'ja, I played her at the 1 (point guard), 2 (shooting guard) and 3 (small forward). I thought the USA team hurt her game because they only had her play by the basket and when I had her during the summer, I had her playing the 2. I missed having her the whole July because she was with a USA team and they had her playing the 4 and 5, I had her playing the 1, 2 and 3. It helped because she got the experience but it hurt because the other girls shot the 3's and took players to the basket, that part of the game she didn't even display and that is the best part of her game. She knows she can do all of that, she knows she could have dominated the game but she decided to play team ball and pass the ball to her teammates because she could have scored 50 points in that game."

Dickerson said that Wilson is planning to take a visit to UConn later this month. When I asked him if she was planning to visit the weekend when the Huskies will hold its annual "First Night" festivities he thought that was the weekend but he was going to reach out to Wilson's family to confirm that and get back to me.

"She talked to UConn already and they have dates set, I think so it is going to be before basketball season and the rest (of the visits) after basketball season," Dickerson said. "Her mom doesn't want her to do visits during the season because she will have a lot of think about. Coaches are going to be on her so she is going to have a whole lot to think about take. She will couple visits before basketball season. Hopefully she will make it beforehand."

That last part was something new because the last time I spoke to Dickerson he thought Wilson would wait until the spring to make her college decision.



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