[BasketballJunkie224Participant]

in everyones opinion who do you think had the best aau team ever?

a lot of people like that so-cal all stars team with jennings, love, Rsidney, taylor king,malik story, hacket…

as well as the tim thomas playaz teams back in the day and also that spiece indy heat team with oden,conley,cook etc, the ny gauchos also has some pretty great squads

IMO i think it was the atlanta celtics with dwight,jsmith,crittenton,morris,,,that team was just unreal..

who does every1 else think would be #1 if you had to pick 1 to be the best ever?

[Tiger1313Participant]

Oden, Conley, Daquean Cook, Josh McRoberts, Eric Gordon. I believe Spiece Indy Heat. Not sure many can compete with that.

[SiggyParticipant]

I’ll take that Indy Spiece team, especially when Gordon still played for them.
Starting lineup: Conley, Eric Gordon, D.Cook, Josh McRoberts, Greg Oden

Edit: ^^^beat me to it

[paradigmnParticipant]

Led by Brandon Jennings, Kevin Love, and Renardo Sidney (when he was skinny). Went 47-0 during the 2006 AAU season.

Here’s a game between the So-Cal All-Stars vs. D1 Grey Hounds led by OJ Mayo and Bill Walker (threw down crazy dunks in the game) during the 2006 Rose City Classic. It’s only the 1st half, but still pretty entertaining.

http://www.ihigh.com/rosecityshowcase/broadcast_165522.html?silverlight=1

Also…here’s an article about the team from Five Star Basketball

http://fivestarbasketball.com/originals/05-28-2011-baddest-summer-team-ever

Three years before he would be picked No. 10 in the NBA Draft, four summers before he would lead the Milwaukee Bucks to the playoffs as a rookie, Brandon Jennings showed a glimpse of the five-frames-ahead vision that makes him one of basketball’s best playmaking point guards.

It was back in 2006 when Jennings, then a rising high school junior, was asked about his AAU summer team: “In the next four years, all of these guys will be pros,” Jennings said.

He was mostly right. The players he spoke of comprised the core of the Southern California All-Stars, better known as the SoCal All-Stars. And in 2006, they went on an incredible run, ripping through the AAU circuit undefeated in 47 games. In the annals of summer basketball, SoCal put itself in the argument next to the 2003 Atlanta Celtics (Dwight Howard, Josh Smith, Randolph Morris) and the 2005 Speice Indy Heat (Greg Oden) as teams considered the greatest of all-time. To many, SoCal holds the crown as No. 1.

Led by head coach Joedy Gardner, SoCal beat the best teams the country had to offer. They beat teams who shouldn’t have been on the court with them. They beat teams hailing from everywhere from Alabama to Illinois, on courts from Oregon to North Carolina. Whoever, whatever was placed in front of them, SoCal always came out with the W.

“It was fun,” Jennings says. “Everybody was after you every game. A lot of people came to see us play. And it was fun to play with Kevin, Taylor, Malik, Daniel and Renardo.”

That would be then-senior center Kevin Love, who went from Lake Oswego (Ore.) High School to UCLA to NBA All-Star status with the Minnesota Timberwolves; senior wing Daniel Hackett, who went from St. John Bosco (Bellflower, Calif.) to USC to a pro career in Italy; sophomore forward Renardo Sidney, an All-American at Fairfax H.S. (Los Angeles, Calif.) who is projected to be an NBA draft pick whenever he decides to leave Mississippi State; junior wing Malik Story, who graduated from Oak Hill Academy (Mouth of Wilson, Va.) and is a starter at the University of Nevada; and senior sharpshooting forward Taylor King, whose winding road took him from Mater Dei H.S. (Santa Ana, Calif.) to Duke to Villanova to this past season playing for Concordia University, an NAIA school in California.

Along with Jennings – who played at Dominguez High in L.A. before transferring to Oak Hill and then playing one year professionally in Italy before entering the NBA – they formed the deepest collection of teenaged talent ever assembled on one AAU team. And despite where their careers went after ’06, remember, all six core players were bona fide stars in high school. Had SoCal been an actual high school team, they could have challenged the legendary Dunbar (Baltimore, Md.) squad that boasted future NBA players Muggsy Bogues, Reggie Lewis, David Wingate and Reggie Williams.

King was a high school star, but sacrificed his game for the SoCal team.

With so much star power at their disposal, SoCal was able to play any style and succeed. “The thing with having so much talent is we had a lot of options,” says assistant coach Kelly Williams, father of former UConn and NBA point guard Marcus Williams. “We were able to adjust to whatever teams were trying to do.”

Kelly Williams also credited the team’s unblemished record to the character of the players.

“It’s tough to get all-star caliber kids to accept roles and take lesser roles for the betterment of the team,” Williams says. “But they understood and were willing to do that. I believe that was the key to everything.”

King and Hackett were prime examples of that team-first attitude. King had the entire offense run through him at legendary Mater Dei, yet with SoCal he was basically a spot-up shooter. Hackett averaged close to a triple-double for St. John Bosco, but often came off the bench for SoCal.

“Most AAU teams are put together with guys that are stars on their own respective (high school) teams,” Williams says. “It’s less structure, just rip-and-run and see who can score more points. That wasn’t our philosophy.”

Malik Story is familiar with playing on stacked teams. At Artesia (Calif.) High School, where he played before transferring to Oak Hill, the 6-5 scorer teamed with Sidney and future NBA Lottery pick James Harden of the Oklahoma City Thunder. At Oak Hill, he played with a number of Division-1 college recruits. At Nevada this past season, Story was one of four players on the Wolf Pack who tied for the team lead by averaging 13 points per game.“Basically, you just have to put your ego aside, put yourself aside, and do what you have to do to win games,” Story says. “It’s a lot more individual (in AAU play), with guys trying to get scholarships and stuff, but it wasn’t like that with us.”

King was the longest-tenured member of the squad, playing with SoCal his entire prep career. “(Before ’06) we didn’t practice a lot, we just showed up and played,” King said. “(In ’06) we concentrated on practicing, and it paid off.”

SoCal showed the full spectrum of its dominance at the Bob Gibbons Tournament of Champions in Chapel Hill, N.C. In the final game, they routed the always-tough New Jersey Playaz by 20 points. To a man, every SoCal player and coach interviewed for this story said the team hit its peak that weekend.

“We knew we were the best, we won every game, and we stuck together,” Love says. “I’d say the biggest thing for us was just coming out and playing as a team. We had the best chemistry out of any AAU team.”

SoCal’s other defining moment came at the Reebok Big Time Tournament in Las Vegas. Featuring almost 300 teams in the field, Big Time was the country’s largest summer basketball showcase, one of the crown jewels of the AAU system. Playing against a D-1 Greyhounds team led by future pro O.J. Mayo (Memphis Grizzlies) in front of a crowd of more than 5,000 spectators, SoCal took a 20-6 lead before winning an 84-53 clinic. Jennings was the primary defender on Mayo, and held the high school All-American to just 10 points while forcing seven turnovers.

In other games during its summer run, SoCal was known to destroy teams by 30 and sometimes 50 points per game.“It was ugly,” Jennings laughed, looking back. “It was real ugly.”

It wasn’t always easy, though. Playing against the D-1 Greyhounds another time in Oregon, SoCal barely won a game in which Mayo dropped 43 points. Another time they escaped Alabama’s SW Elite squad by just one point, a game in which they trailed by 17 in the first half. And earlier at the Reebok Big Time Tournament, SoCal edged out Chicago’s Mean Streets Express by six points, holding back future pros Derrick Rose (Chicago Bulls) and Eric Gordon (L.A. Clippers).

“They just have a loaded team,” said Gordon, whose AAU team had lost to SoCal three times that summer, five years ago. “Everybody is good … all 10 of their ballplayers are good. They’re loaded from the starting five to the five coming off the bench. Just from every aspect, they were off the charts.”

Understandably, the tons of highlights have in time blurred together over time for members of that SoCal team. “A lot of Kevin’s outlets, a lot of people knocking down threes in crunch time … me going through the lane and dunking on people. We did a lot,” Jennings says.

Inevitably, SoCal gained villain-like status on the summer circuit. Because just as the New York Yankees, USC football and Duke basketball can attest, everyone wants to see the top dog fall on his face.

“Everyone wanted us to lose,” Story says. “Especially at the (Kingwood) tournament in Houston and (Gibbons T.O.C.) in North Carolina. Toward the end of the summer, we realized people didn’t want us to win.”

Their wishes were never granted.

[MkadozaParticipant]

Whatever team had both Derrick Rose and Eric Gordon.

[WolfRobParticipant]

The Two best teams I’ve seen…

Atlanta Celtics. Just unreal for AAU kids.. Dwight & Jsmith in high school…. Just freaks!

Friends of Hoop (Seattle) were also really good! Martell Webster, Spencer Hawes, Jon Brockman, Micah Downs.

[WolfRobParticipant]

[GoJOSH HUESTISParticipant]

Second picture, John “uncage the” Gage and Aaron Bright

[WolfRobParticipant]

[BKGingerSnapParticipant]

Riverside Church NYC 95-97 Ron Artest, Lamar Odom, Elton Brand, Erick Barkley are good but no one tops the

OaklandSoldiers: Kendrick Perkins, Leon Powe, and Lebron James. Game Over, I’m taking Lebron’s team

[joecheck88Participant]

The team that came to mind when I read the topic was the Atlanta Celtics team. Could you imagine trying to get to the rim on that team?? It would be an absolute nightmare. 2 NBA sized Centers and an athletic 6’9″ combo forward. The next two teams that come to mind are the Indiana team with Oden, Conley, Cook. And the SoCal allstars with Jennings, Love and I think Taylor King was on that team to.

[M-EazyParticipant]

This is a hard question with AAU just really becoming this nationally recognized. Luckily I’m from Hampton, VA where there’s a annual big time AAU tournament (now a stop on the EYBL season circuit). Just a few good teams I’ve seen in the past.

Mean Streets with Derrick Rose and Eric Gordon was niice.
ATL Celtics with Dwight Howard, Josh Smith, and Randolph Morris
Georgia Stars with Louis Williams and Mike Mercer
Boo Williams with Allen Iverson and Joe Smith

[BasketballJunkie224Participant]

yea i forgot about that georgia stars team, what ever happened to mike mercer anyway?

[SiggyParticipant]

He under-performed, tore his ACL then proceeded to be a screw up at both Georgia and South Florida.

[paradigmnParticipant]

Just saw this from CBS Sports and remembered this topic. The article said the 2006 SoCal All-Stars was the best AAU team.

http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/blog/eye-on-college-basketball/21612852/recruiting-rodeo-breaking-down-big-three-top-aau-teams

Travel-team basketball just isn’t the same these days, and that’s not really up for debate. The CIA Bounce and Oakland Soldiers teams of this past summer were good, as were the 2011 versions of Team Takeover and Houston Defenders. But how do they stack up to the top teams of the past decade?

According to a poll of coaches and scouts from around the country, it’s not even close.

Here are the top-three AAU teams of the past 10 years:

1. 2006 SoCal All-Stars: Brandon Jennings, Kevin Love, Daniel Hackett, Taylor King, Renardo Sidney, Malik Story

The year before, this group had Chase Budinger in the mix. The only two losses that they took in the spring and summer of 2006 came when Love wasn’t available. Would love to see them go head-to-head with the Celtics.

2. 2003 Atlanta Celtics: Dwight Howard, Josh Smith, Randolph Morris, Javaris Crittenton

This team also had Brandon Rush up until the summer, completing a dynamite backcourt to combine with a dominant frontcourt. Just think about getting a layup or rebound against that front line. Not happening.

3. 2004-2005 Spiece Indy Heat: Mike Conley, Eric Gordon, Daequan Cook, Josh McRoberts, Greg Oden

This was a heckuva two-year run for the Indianapolis-based AAU program. The future Ohio State trio was joined by Gordon and McRoberts in 2004 but might have been even better in 2005.

Honorable mention:

2006 Mean Streets: Derrick Rose, Eric Gordon

This group could make a case as the best AAU backcourt in recent memory, as Rose and Gordon simply steamrolled opponents.

2009 All-Ohio Red: Jared Sullinger, Adreian Payne, Aaron Craft

This team lost only nine games over a three-year span, winning a variety of tournaments

[AwardedBallerParticipant]

2006 Mean streets, it was like watching John Wall and Brad Beal compete against elementary schoolers, just blew opponents out. My runner up is probably 10-11 Drew Gooden Soldiers, team carried 10 top 40 players between each Class.

[FastAndFuriousParticipant]

I think D1 Greyhounds deserve some respect as well, they used to pop teams.

And at the time OJ Mayo and Bill Walker was like the Kobe Bryant and Vince Carter of HS, and they high Tyus Jones, Cookie Miller,Keenan Ellis, etc…..

But I think the best team of all time had to be So-Cal they never lost….

[GoJOSH HUESTISParticipant]

D.C ASSULT

Dermar Johnson
Keith Bogans
Val Brown
Derrick Payne
Joe Forte-first team Allamerican in H.S
James white-Mcdonals All American
Val Brown -lead NCAA in scoring as a freshman
Keith Bogans -first team All American in H.S
Brian Chase
DerMarr Johnson-first team All American in H.S
Cliff Hawkins
Rodney White
Bernard Robinson
David Holmes
David Hawkins
Kevin Lyde

They may not have had many guys who made it and stuck in the NBA but at the time they were great in H.S and won the national AAU title

3 first team All American Srs ( not many if any AAU teams can say that)

[Xwarrior7Participant]

but my favorite was the Meanstreets team of Eric Gordon & Derrick Rose. That was a special backcourt.

[bouncem24949Participant]

http://www.legendssf.com/blogs/news/14491885-10-best-aau-basketball-teams-ever

[bouncem24949Participant]

http://www.legendssf.com/blogs/news/14491885-10-best-aau-basketball-teams-ever

[McDunkin]

Gotta say the So Cal all stars. Looking back now their depth was amazing.

Besides the known names on the roster they had players such as (McDonald all Americans)James Keefe, Chace Stanback, the Wear twins and other future D-1 players in 7 footer Alex Jacobson, Andy Brown, and others getting bench minutes

[McDunkin]

Gotta say the So Cal all stars. Looking back now their depth was amazing.

Besides the known names on the roster they had players such as (McDonald all Americans)James Keefe, Chace Stanback, the Wear twins and other future D-1 players in 7 footer Alex Jacobson, Andy Brown, and others getting bench minutes

[sittinseneParticipant]

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[sittinseneParticipant]

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