Trevor Cooney didn’t get much run at all in Wednesday’s gold medal game between the US and Brazil in the FIBA Americas U18 Championship. Cooney played just five minutes and didn’t crack the scoring column, missing his only shot, which was a three-pointer. Unlike the three blowouts before Wednesday night’s game, this one was tight throughout, and the good guys won by a slim margin, 81-78 (hey, just like in ’03!).

I’ve talked a little bit about how well Austin Rivers has played, and mentioned that Kyrie Irving is one of the can’t-miss guys of the class of 2010. There are two other players from this team who you should know about,  Marquette commit Vander Blue and power forward Quincy Miller.

Blue will be a freshman this fall for the Golden Eagles and is a combo guard, with great explosiveness and a strong body for someone his size. He didn’t light up the scoreboard, but you will be hearinging a lot out about him, as he’s considered one of the top newcomers in the Big East.

Miller is thought of as the country’s top power forward in the class of 2011, and averaged 14 points and over 10 rebounds in five games of action. He has offers from many of the usual suspects, but at this time, SU isn’t one of them.

Cooney’s line from the final wasn’t very encouraging at first glance, but you have to keep in mind that some of his teammates have a year of development on him, or in the case of Washington’s Abdul Gaddy, two. Still, Cooney put up two very good performances in four games, and the mere fact that Cooney was on the team is a reflection of how highly he’s thought of as a player.

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 1st, 2010 at 12:30 am by Brian G. . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.