This past weekend, Metroball DC put a talented group of youth together to compete in the first ever Jr. NBA World Championship event in King of Prussia, PA. This was the Mid-Atlantic Regional with the winner going on to compete in Orlando this August. This event is the NBA’s way of cleaning up youth AAU and travel basketball. The rules were a mixture of FIBA and NBA rules, so it took a little while to get used to them. Especially the rule where you can only call time outs during a dead ball and no passing back court during in-bounding. Also if a team doesn’t call a time out after a certain amount of time, the referee has to call a media time out. So it was a learning experience as well.
We sent some of our best 14u Boys to represent us in this event. All though we we
re missing 2 key players, we still competed well with what we had. Allen Concepcion #2 led all scorers in each game with an outstanding performance this past weekend. His tenacity with rebounding and scoring propelled our team to the Gold division championship game. Another major factor of our success was Darren “June” Buchanan Jr. His height and ability to score around the basket at will created all types of match-up problems for our opponents. Even though they fell short by 5 points in the championship game, the whole team played well from top to bottom. This was a very good experience for the youth and the Organization. We know that we can compete with the best. Coach Aspen McNair did a superb job of coaching these youths in this special event. It was a victory for everyone involved. We are looking forward to competing again next year. 
