TEAM TENNESSEE SQUAD | Prep Girls Hoops (2024)

Hoop fans! I hope all is well. Just like many of you who follow the NBA, WNBA, and the college game,how many of you guys have been keeping up with the latest saga surrounding Caitlyn Clark being left off the Team USA roster? I know there is a criteria and all that and we know what the results are, but just like many of you, you are probably puzzled about the selection especially with all the buzz surrounding her. However, it got me thinking, what if there was a Team Tennessee squad who battled and competed against other states who had their own Team ______ squad? Think of the publicity and how much fun it would be to see some of the top hoopers go toe to toe representing where they lived. To be honest with you, the selection process would be extremely hard, but if the top players in each class battled it out alongside others, just think about what the squad would look like and what the process would be.

Now, each year we have all-star teams, all whatever teams, this team, that team, and so on. In my personal opinion, these can be very biased as not all players play each other during the regular or post season. They may see each other in summer league or on the travel ball circuit, but it’s still not the same. We don’t have a camp where we bring the top talent together and let them compete for something bigger. We need something like that just so we can get a true idea of who our top players are. Sure girls past the eye test. But can we really say this girl is better than that one if they don’t go against each other?. Don’t get me wrong, all players bring something special to the table, however, if player 1a. battles player 1b., who will become the top dog.

In upcoming articles, you are going to see a lot of this or that type stuff. Why? It’s different. I’ll roll out something here in the coming days just to be creative. So below I am going to create a scenario where we are going to (pretend) and invite the top 96 kids in the state to this camp. At this camp, the girls are going to battle it out for 12 positions that will represent the state at a Team whatever event. At this camp /combine, girls from the classes 2025-2028 are invited (apologies to an exceptional class from the 2004 ranks.). The girls would compete for specific roster spots. For example:

PG (2)

SG (2)

SF (2)

PF (2)

C (2)

Utility (2)

In my mind if this were to go down, teams would play a Group Stage event and then a knockout round. Now if your squad goes further, obviously the better chance one would have. So as I think this through, just think of what an event like this would do for the game.

Criteria: Each player chosen for this list was ranked in the top 25 in their prospective class. They were then allocated by position and then filled in from there. That way, each team would have bigs, ball handlers , shooters, and so forth. Then based on statistics and position, we would find 12 young ladies who would make the cut and be nominated for a spot on the final roster.

So enjoy my creativity as I try my best to create the Team Tennessee team that will represent our state.