Chris Dokish, Connecticut Recruiting, Marquette Recruiting, Rutgers Recruiting

AAU PROFILE OF THE UNIQUE ALL-STARS

By Chris Dokish

New York City and New Jersey is known to have some of the best high school basketball players in the country, and consequently they also have some of the best AAU teams in the country. But if you go east of New York City, you’ll end up in Long Island where you find the Unique All-Stars.

Headquartered in the Dix Hills area, smack dab in the middle of Long Island, the team was started by successful businessman Torrel Harris, whose clothing company, Unique Sports Generation, at one time had licenses with both the NBA and NFL. Now Harris is helping his son, Torrel, Jr., get his own urban clothing line off the ground. Called TorrelTorrel, the ambitious project features classic images of the legendary Nintendo gaming system.

“The Unique All-Stars started with a girls team,” says Harris, whose daughter, Tesia, just finished her freshman season playing at Delaware. “Then when my son, Tobias, was eight years old, I wanted him to learn the game correctly, to understand the fundamentals, so I decided to coach him and his friends. Then the kids kept asking me to continue it so I did.”

Harris, it should be noted, is not just a dad who thinks he knows more than somebody who actually played basketball. Harris did play basketball, at Duquesne, and one of his former teammates was former L.A. Lakers great Norm Nixon. Harris also has friends who help with basketball advice, including NBA legend George Gervin who spends time every year instructing Tobias.

It is Tobias Harris who is the star of the team. Only 15 years old and already 6’8” tall, Tobias has already received major offers from the likes of Connecticut, Arizona, Indiana, Rutgers, Maryland, and Marquette. But Tobias also plays for other AAU teams as well.

“The team is just a group of friends that has been playing together since they were eight,” admits Harris. “Most of them don’t have college careers ahead of them so they often can’t make tournaments because of a dance, or a date, or something else they find more important. For that reason, I often send Tobias to play for another team so that he can still play.”

Recently, however, Harris loaded up his team for the IS8 tournament, adding twins Marcus and Markieff Morris, both headed to Kansas, as well as top 2010 guard Taran Buie. The team was not only successful, but it also proved to detractors that Tobias could dominate outside of Long Island.

It’s unknown if Harris would continue coaching after his son becomes too old to play AAU, but he funds teams down to the eight year old classification, so it will probably go on without his actual coaching. The present team has good players and according to Harris he has two sleepers that colleges should take notice of.

“Marcus Damus is a 6’7” wing that’s a really good athlete, can shoot, and can really finish,” says Harris. “He’s in the 11th grade this year at Bayshore. Justin Toussaint is a 6’2” guard and he is a defensive stopper. Doron Lamb scored 14 points on us in the first half during one game, I put Justin on him after the half and he held him scoreless. He also did well against Dominic Cheek. That’s two of the best players in the country. Justin’s nothing fancy, he just gets the job done. He played for St. Thomas More in Connecticut, but now he’s at Cardozo. He’s just finishing up 10th grade. Both these kids need to be checked out by coaches.”

Chris Dokish is a NBE Basketball Report contributor as well as a contributing editor of the Pittsburgh Sports Report where his stories are often featured in their Keystone Recruiting newsletter series, which you can sign up for free at their website.

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