Round 1 (South) - Carolinas advance

A Carolinas squad led by Chris Paul & Ray Allen took out a Florida team led by Amare & Vince.

With the NCAA Basketball Tournament right around the corner, I decided to create an NBA State Tournament to see which states are producing the best players. Serious bragging rights are at stake!

Do certain states excel at producing certain positions? Which states have the most talent per capita? Most importantly, who’s going to go all the way? Help me decide by voting for each matchup, and we’ll crown an NBA State Champion right around the time of the NCAA Championship game.

NBA State Tournament Rules: - To qualify, players must have played in at least one NBA game this season (Sorry Brand & Oden) and be on a current NBA roster. - Players are affiliated with the state they graduated High School in rather than the State born in. (Information courtesy of: Basketball-Reference.com). Key differences will be noted. - There are 16 total “Teams” separated into 4 Regions. - Teams are seeded using this formula: Total population (rounded to the nearest million) x 1/2 + Total # of current players. - Smaller states are merged together until they total 16+ active players. - Rosters of 12 are chosen for each team. - Vote for which team you think would win in a 7 game series on a neutral court. - 1st Round Polls are open for 7 days ONLY before a winner is declared. - New 1st Round Matchup posted every 3 days. - After voting, please comment on which team you picked, how many games to win, and why.

Our 2nd South Region matchup features #2 seed Florida vs. #3 seed North Carolina/ South Carolina…
Click here for the 1st South Region matchup: #1 seed Alabama/ Georgia vs. #4 seed Louisiana/ Mississippi.

#2 Seed

South Region

Florida (17 players)

Total Population = 18,251,243

PG: Jose Juan Barea / Keyon Dooling / Chucky Atkins

Jose Juan Barea was born and raised in Puerto Rico, but he moved to Miami for his senior year in high school, where he led his team to the Class 1A state title and was named Miami-Dade’s Player of the Year. Despite being named an Honorable Mention All-American in college, he went undrafted. Now he’s backing up one of the greatest PG’s of our generation and could develop into a solid starter someday. Keyon Dooling is quietly having a solid season for Orlando. He plays solid D and is getting to the line 7.2 times per 48 minutes. If Chucky actually played this season, I would probably name him starter, but he hasn’t proven anything in awhile.

SG: Raja Bell / Eddie Jones

Raja was born in St. Croix (Virgin Islands), but he went to high school and college (Florida International) in the Sunshine State. You’ve got to give him serious props for playing at a small college and going undrafted to being one of the top defenders and 3-point shooters in the league. Eddie Jones in his prime was the shit! His defense was just as good as Raja’s is now, and he was a lot more athletic. Eddie’s on the downside of his career now, but he’s still a solid backup. You know what you’re getting with these two.

SF: Vince Carter / James Jones / Damien Wilkins

Vince was born and raised in Florida, but he went to UNC for college. He’s never been known as a lockdown defender, so it’s a good thing he’s got Raja Bell on his his team here. VC can still take over a game offensively on occasion, but it seems like his best years are behind him. James Jones starred at the University of Miami and is having a breakout season for Portland. Florida will rely on him to score a lot of points in bunches off the bench. The son of Gerald and nephew of ‘Nique makes the cut over the Graham brothers. Damien is thick and I like how he throws his body around.

PF: Udonis Haslem / Reggie Evans

Haslem was pretty fat when he was a Florida Gator (topped out over 300), but now he’s chiseled and rugged. He has his limitations, but his mid-range jumper is money and you know he’ll scrap in the paint. Reggie Evans is a rebounding machine, but probably one of the worst offensive players in the league.

C: Amare Stoudemire / Solomon Jones

Amare holds the crown as Florida’s #1 current player, and if he keeps improving, he could join David Robinson and Artis Gilmore as the best players ever born there. JJ Barea played like Steve Nash in the Summer league, but the drop-off could be significant for Stoudemire. Solomon Jones hasn’t gotten a chance to play big minutes in the NBA, but he’s a decent shot-blocker off the bench.

Just missed the cut: Stephen Graham, Joey Graham.

I felt bad for leaving out both of the Graham brothers, but they were born in Delaware and went to Oklahoma St. for college, so they’re not reppin’ Florida too hard anyway.

Everyone else: Taurean Green, Jerome James, Chris Richard.

Team analysis:

Much like Dwight Howard for the Georgia/ Alabama team, Amare is going to have to carry Florida on his back. Vince is a capable 2nd scorer and Raja Bell anchors the D, but this team has serious question marks. Can any of their point guards play at an elite level for extended periods of time? What are they going to do when Amare’s on the bench? Despite their lack of size, I would probably give Jones AND Wilkins a lot of minutes at power forward to provide some scoring punch and keep Evans and Jones on the bench. How highly you view Florida is going to depend on what you think of Vince Carter and J.J. Barea probably. I actually feel more confident in Barea being a serviceable PG than I do in Vince being the #2 player on a winning team at this point.

#3 Seed

South Region

North Carolina (13 players) +

South Carolina (5 players)

Combined Population = 13,468,741

PG: Chris Paul (NC) / Raymond Felton (SC) / Darrell Armstrong (NC)

Paul was North Carolina’s Mr. Basketball for 2003 and he went to college at Wake Forest, so he’s NC all the way. If you haven’t heard me talk about CP3 in the past, all you need to know is that if I were starting a franchise today, I would probably take him 3rd after LeBron and Superman. Felton was actually Mr. Basketball for South Carolina in 2001 and 2002 before becoming a Tar Heel, but the Bobcats are still waiting for him to take his game to the next level. He’s not a pure point guard, but he could probably learn a thing or two from Chris Paul. I chose Darrell Armstrong as my 12th man over Mikki Moore because he seems like a great veteran to have around.

SG: Ray Allen (SC) / Marquis Daniels (SC)

Ray Allen was born at Castle Air Force Base in Merced, California, but he attended high school in South Carolina and led his team to a state championship. Jesus Shuttleworth is one of the greatest shooters to ever play this game, and if he plays three more seasons, he could surpass Reggie Miller as the All-Time leader for threes made. Marquis Daniels flashed enough brilliance to earn a 6-year, $38 million contract, but he hasn’t improved much since then. I like him in the open court, but his jump shot is a liability. Help him out Jesus!

SF: Tracy McGrady (NC) / Renaldo Balkman (NC)

Here is where the “State born in” vs. “State went to high school in” argument begins. T-Mac was born in Florida, but he attended Mt. Zion Christian Academy for high school in North Carolina. I’ll go into this further when I talk about the Virginia squad loaded with Oak Hill academy stars, but I decided to use high school data over birth data because it seems like the number of players who move at a young age and identify with their newer state is greater than the number of players who move right before high school (usually for hoops purposes) and identify with their original state. So the NC/ SC team benefits by landing T-Mac, but how much are they really benefiting? McGrady is an incredible 1-on-1 player, but he’s never made it past the 1st round of the playoffs (in six tries). I’m a big fan of Renaldo Balkman’s energy off the bench. It’s funny because he and T-Mac are roughly the same size, but their games couldn’t be more opposite.

PF: David West (NC) / Antawn Jamison (NC) / Chris Wilcox (NC)

KG was actually born and raised in South Carolina, but he transferred to Farragut Academy in Chicago before his senior year. So while the Carolinas squad loses KG, they gain T-Mac AND David West. That’s a pretty fair trade-off when you consider how well West has played this season. West was born two days before me and he has an “X” tattooed on his arm that says “my life, my way” so I already like the guy. DX just gets the job done. As Warriors fans can attest to, Jamison can NOT carry a team, but he would be an incredible 6th man. The former UNC star is the best in the league at finishing with odd flip shots and putbacks. Chris Wilcox gives the Carolinas team a very talented trio of power forwards. You could even play all three at the same time by moving Jamo over to small forward and Wilcox to center.

C: Jermaine O’Neal (SC) / Brendan Haywood (NC)

It’s hard to believe, but this is Jermaine O’Neal’s 12th year in the league. The former South Carolina high school star has had a good, but not quite great career. He’s currently injured, so you may want to factor him in at just 80% of his max ability (since it doesn’t look like he’ll be 100% for quite some time). Still, he’s a talented player who will thrive playing with so many other stars. I’m a bigger fan of Etan Thomas, but Brendan Haywood is a big dude and a very solid backup center.

Just missed the cut: Anthony Johnson (SC), Mikki Moore (SC).

As the Hawks recently realized, Anthony Johnson is a solid backup point guard and nothing more. He lost out to Darrell Armstrong, who seems older (he is), wiser, and more entertaining. Mikki Moore is known around the league for loving snakes, but he hasn’t lived up to expectations after last year’s breakout season. The Carolina’s squad has enough talent up front without him.

Everyone else: Bobby Jackson (NC), Shavlik Randolph (NC), Cedric Simmons (NC), Shawne Williams (NC).

Team analysis:

As I already noted, the Carolina’s team lost KG because he moved to Chicago to finish high school, but they gained T-Mac and David West in return. They have perhaps the best point guard in the league, one of the greatest shooters of All-Time, a talented trio of power forwards, and two borderline stars who didn’t go to college. They have capable backups at each position, and are capable of beating any team in this tournament.

NBA State Tournament

Round 1

South Region: #2 vs. #3

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Poll Ends: Wednesday, February 27th @ 11:59pm PST

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My pick:

in 5 games

You’ve got some nice matchups here: Raja Bell will try to stop Ray Allen from scoring and the cousins (Carter & McGrady) will go at it at small forward. Amare is a dominant force right now, but the Carolina’s squad has a lot of talent and beef to contain him up front.

The major mismatch here is at point guard, where Chris Paul will pretty much run circles around anyone Florida has to offer.

In fact, I feel pretty confident in saying that you could give T-Mac back to Florida and the North Carolina/ South Carolina squad would will prevail. Anyone agree? I mean, T-Mac and Vince would probably fight over shots while the Carolina’s team would just slide Jamison over to small forward and give more minutes to Balkman to lock up Vince or Tracy. Considering all the hoopla that Carter and McGrady have gotten over their careers, I think that says a lot about how much more valuable and beneficial it is to have a player like Chris Paul.