All-Time UH Team: Las Vegas

Jordan Cannon (45)

We posted an article giving a few UH legends 2K ratings last Friday to celebrate the release of NBA 2K20. We’re going to keep the momentum going this week by releasing our own version of All-Time Teams, just like 2K has in this year’s game. I reached out to multiple UH staff members in multiple regions to get their picks for an all-time starting five in their respective region. The one caveat is a player has to have played 100 career games to be considered. We start with Las Vegas, which was submitted by Summerlin League Coordinator, L.C. Comine.

Skinkis

Chase Skinkis

There’s really no other place to start with an all-time Vegas team other than with the first-ballot Hall of Famer. Skinkis has been playing in Las Vegas almost as long as anyone, as he is one of only five players in Las Vegas history to play in over 400 games. He’s made the most of his 418 games, averaging 17.6/10.3/8.4 and winning 14 championships, tied for the second-most in Vegas history.

Skinkis runs the point on this team and is more than willing to score zero points per game if needed, considering the other elite scorers that will make up this roster. His combination of unselfishness, court vision and athleticism make him the perfect player to orchestrate a run-and-gun type of team.

Hollis Hale

Hale is the other Vegas player that has 14 championships, with seven of those while he was playing with Skinkis. They have played many seasons together in Summerlin with the Villains and have had consistent success as teammates in Vegas leagues and at national tournaments. Hale is the perfect running partner in the backcourt with Skinkis, as he’s more than willing to leak out in transition, spot-up in the corner and burry open 3s. He’s shot 45% from deep in his UH career, and a lot of those made 3s have been assisted by Skinkis.

When Hale isn’t running in the Summerlin Open League, he’s dominating the Green Valley Vet League, where he’s been arguably the best vet player in Vegas history. In 115 career vet games, he’s averaged 26.9/6.9/7 with shooting splits of 46/43/79. He’s won five vet league titles and he also holds the vet league record of 100 points in a single game.

Jodan Cannon

Cannon is just eligible for this team, as he’s played in 106 career games. You could argue that there’s more deserving players with more impressive resumes over multiple years, but Cannon has made the most with the 106 games he’s played in. Since making his UH debut in the Fall of 2016, he’s been arguably the best player in UH Vegas. He’s averaged 29.6/8/7.1 with shooting splits of 60/43/81 in 98 open league games and eight national tournament games.

In his 98 Summerlin Open League games, he has a 71-27 record with three championships. His dominance with BTE has been on full display since the Summer 2018 season, where BTE has gone 40-2 with three championships, one loss coming in a championship game and a current 5-0 record this season in games he’s played. That’s an impressive enough resume to make an all-time team with only 106 games played.

Warren Rosegreen

Rosegreen (4)

Summerlin has been around a few years longer than Green Valley, so it makes sense that Summerlin would be more represented than Green Valley on this team. Rosegreen has played a vast majority of his games in Green Valley, and is one of the most consistent players that gym has ever seen. He’s currently playing in his 13th season in Green Valley, and he’s won eight championships in the previous 12 seasons.

His numbers have always been consistent, as he’s averaged a double-double in eight of his 15 total open league seasons. His career averages in the open league are 26.4 points and 11 rebounds on 58% shooting from the field. He’s never shot under 50% in a season, and he’s averaged under 20 points only once, when he scored 19.8 points per game in the Spring 2017 season, when he won one of his eight titles. I’m convinced Rosegreen will be scoring 20 or more a game for at least another decade with his jump hook, which feels like it goes in every time.

Travis Scribner

It’s not often that a player that averages 3.9 points per game in their career would make an all-time team, but Scribner makes a huge impact on a game without scoring. “No Fly Zone” earned his nickname from averaging 4.1 blocks per game, which got him to become the first player in UH history to record over 1,000 blocks. He’s also averaged 12.2 rebounds per game, making him a defense and rebounding machine.

Scribner getting onto this team is eerily similar to Dennis Rodman making the Basketball Hall of Fame. Rodman averaged 7.3 points and 13.1 rebounds per game in his NBA career. He’s arguably the greatest rebounder of all-time, and one of the best defenders in NBA history. There’s a lot of ways to make an impact on the game without scoring, and Scribner is a perfect example of that. He affects almost every shot in the paint when he’s on the floor, and he’s elite on blocking shots to teammates instead of sending them out of bounds, creating turnovers for his team. There have been a lot of dominant big men in UH Vegas, and there’s no right or wrong answer for this team, but I’m not going to argue Scribner should be left off. His resume speaks for itself.

Comine’s analysis: “This starting five, if all in their prime, would be unstoppable. Hale and Cannon could score at will, and some don’t know Hale could get to the rack in his younger years. Scribner was one of the most feared players to go up against when I first moved here almost 8 years ago, and putting Rosegreen with these guys would be darn right unfair.”

My verdict: I think this team is pretty unassailable. Las Vegas is a region loaded with talent and history, so narrowing this down to five players is very difficult. You could have a bench of Jerome Williams, Josh McCarver, Charlie Farber, Kerry Knoll, Reggie Jackson, Robert Sandoval and Tony Eackles Jr., all players you could make a case for being included in the starting five. McCarver is the hardest omission for me, and I would probably include him over Rosegreen, but that would make this list extremely one-sided for Summerlin players. You can’t ignore Green Valley completely, so I can see why Comine decided on Rosegreen over McCarver, especially considering how dominant Rosegreen has been in Green Valley and in national tournaments.