The Seattle Pride Basketball 16U boys’ team is in Las Vegas for two national tournaments, and doing well, according to Coach Jason Vann:

The team has 10 West Seattle kids: 2 go to Seattle Lutheran (Josh Meyer and Roberto Duenaz), 2 go to West Seattle (Nate Pryor and Tyler Lenzie), 2 go to Shorewood Christian (JJ Young & Jovi Fevealaki), and then we finish out the roster with Jaxon Woodward (Seattle Prep), Matthew Sassanoff (Kennedy), Emilio Mancol (Kennedy), Evan Moe (Chief Sealth), Shea Carstens (O’Dea).

(On Thursday) they won the AAU championships in Las Vegas and they went 4-0, winning all 4 games by double digits. They beat teams from Texas, Hawaii, Canada, and California en route to the championship. This is coming off a loss in the finals in Bellevue last week (NW summer showcase) versus a very tough Maeko team (Oregon) who was ranked #23 in the nation and #5 in the west coast. However, we were the last Washington team standing.

Right after that, the boys started pool play in the Bigfoot Hoops Las Vegas Classic, which Vann describes as “the top 160 16U teams in the nation. They finished 3-0 and are now “the last Washington team standing to play in the top 32 platinum elite division for 16U. Loser out from here on out… Last 32 out of 160 teams! West Seattle kids hanging with national powerhouse programs!” The bracket shows their next game is 2:30 pm today against a team from Ohio.