Hoop City Classic will draw top prep stars and teams
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. -– Some of the top high school basketball players in the country are scheduled to play in the ninth annual Hoop City Classic at the Sanford Pentagon in Sioux Falls and the Corn Palace in Mitchell.
The 28-game schedule features high school and college basketball programs from seven states Dec. 27–30. The Corn Palace will host 18 games during the four-day event, while the Pentagon’s Heritage Court will host 10 games.
Notable players and teams in the Hoop City Classic:
- Isaiah Stewart: The fourth-ranked player on ESPN’s Top 100 is a five-star recruit who plays for La Lumiere (Indiana). Stewart has multiple offers from perennial top college basketball programs including Duke, Michigan State, Syracuse and Villanova.
- Matthew Hurt: The sixth-ranked player on ESPN’s Top 100 is a five-star recruit who plays for John Marshall High School (Minnesota). Hurt also has more than a dozen offers from schools including Arizona, Duke, Kansas, Kentucky, Memphis and North Carolina.
- Trendon Watford: The five-start recruit is also the 23rd-ranked player on ESPN’s Top 100. Watford plays for Mountain Brook High School (Alabama) and is coached by last season’s boys basketball national coach of the year, Bucky McMillian. Alabama’s Mr. Basketball has offers from SEC schools Alabama, Auburn and Mississippi State.
- P.J. Fuller: The four-star recruit and 67th-ranked player on ESPN’s Top 100, who plays for Findlay Prep (Nevada), is committed to TCU.
- DeLasalle (Minnesota): The powerhouse boys basketball team from Minneapolis has won 23 state tournaments including six of the last seven Class 3A titles.
- Coronado (Nevada): The Las Vegas team is the only public high school to have two guards invited to Team USA’s minicamp this year. Jaden Hardy is the No. 1-ranked shooting guard in the Class of 2021 while teammate Richard Isaacs is the top-ranked point guard on the West Coast in the Class of 2022.
High school girls programs include Aberdeen Central, Sioux Falls Christian, DeLaSalle (Minnesota), Hutchinson (Minnesota), Sioux Falls Lincoln, Mitchell and Waconia (Minnesota). Boys teams are Aberdeen Central, Breckenridge (Minnesota), Bridgewater Emery, Sioux Falls Christian, Coronado (Nevada), DeLaSalle (Minnesota), Dominican (Wisconsin), Findlay Prep (Nevada), La Lumiere (Indiana), Sioux Falls Lincoln, Mitchell, Mitchell Christian, Mountain Brook (Alabama), Sioux Falls O’Gorman, Tea, Sioux Falls Washington and Yankton.
The Hoop City Classic again contains the Coach Gary Munson Tournament, named in honor of Mike Miller’s high school coach who led Mitchell to 34 state tournament appearances, nine state championships, 18 Eastern South Dakota Conference titles and five state runner-up honors.
Mountain Brook and DeLaSalle will play the first game of the Coach Gary Munson Tournament on Dec. 28 at 3:30 p.m. at the Corn Palace. The Findlay Prep Pirates and La Lumiere Lakers will meet in game two of the First Dakota National Tournament. The winner will advance to the Hoop City Classic tournament championship game on Dec. 29 at the Sanford Pentagon.
Four college men’s basketball teams will also play four games at the Corn Palace as part of the Doug Martin Classic: Dakota State University, Dakota Wesleyan University, Peru (Nebraska) and St. Mary’s (Kansas). Doug Martin is the former head coach at Dakota Wesleyan, where he led the Tigers to four conference titles and was named conference coach of the year three times.
Tickets go on sale Nov. 1 at Ticketmaster.com, cornpalace.com and the Corn Palace and Pentagon box offices.
