Glenn Nelson/ESPN.comBria Smith (right) may find herself battling Bria Hartley for top club team honors this season. NEW YORK -- Pooling resources in these dramatic economic times is nothing new. But in an area considered the cradle of basketball, consolidation also means an escalation in a hoops war being conducted on and off the court.
Three New York area club teams, two of which at various times could lay claim to being the region's best, are combining forces and re-emerging as the New York Liberty Belles Elite and will be sponsored by Nike, according to the new team's coach and program director, Marc Riley.
The team essentially merges the Silver Bullets, the Long Island-based team which played at last year's Nike Nationals, and the Liberty Belles, whose spot the Silver Bullets filled as coach Jill Cook, an assistant at Christ the King, took a timeout. A third team, New Heights, literally but not officially is part of the merge, though its coach, Chez Williams, left the program, as well as his spot on the Murry Bergtraum High School bench for what Riley calls "personal reasons."
The merger leaves Riley's team with a strong core, which includes Stefanie Dolson, the Connecticut commit he coached with the Silver Bullets; Bria Smith, a Christ the King sophomore and ESPN HoopGurlz Hundred watch-list designee who likely would have played for the Liberty Belles, and Doris Ortega, one of the region's best guard prospects and the top player from the former New Heights team.
Dolson, ranked No. 13 in the Super Sixty for 2010, confirmed her participation with the new Liberty Belles Elite, telling ESPN HoopGurlz, "I'm very excited about it. Finally. ...I need to play in the summer, to stay in shape and get better."
Apache Paschall, who coaches the new program's primary New York rival, Exodus, which is unaffiliated, said he was not concerned about the merger.
"I call them Team ICU," said Paschall, also the head coach at St. Michael Academy. "You're taking three organizations who were all on crutches and need to hold each other up."
The nucleus of Paschall's team will include Bria Hartley, a Long Islander ranked No. 4 in the Super Sixty, plus No. 41 Brittany Webb and No. 58 Jennifer O'Neil from his St. Michael squad.
The top Exodus team, bolstered by other players from teams in the Northeast, will make a playing tour of Russia in April, Paschall said. The tour is being financed by a prominent Russian businessman, according to Paschall.
Riley, who also coaches at Smithson West High School, said he and Williams had been holding exploratory talks for months. "We knew we wanted to do something," Riley said, "we just didn't know what." Riley started talking with Cook in the fall and, with the help of Vinny Cannizaro, the legendary former coach at Christ the King and Liberty Belles founder, they agreed on parameters for consolidating the teams.
The Liberty Belles Elite will play in the Boo Williams Invitational, in Hampton, Va., in the spring and, of course, Nike Nationals, among other events, in the summer.
"This puts us in a different light," Riley said. "The prestige of Nike attracts a different level of players. There will be different standards to uphold."
