Separated by three miles on Calvine Road, Monterey Trail and Sheldon high schools have formed a friendly athletic rivalry as members of the Delta River League.
The players and coaches are friends off the court and respect each other on, yet neither wants to lose to the other, maybe more so than any other team in the DRL.
That bond forged into a unique relationship that has developed the Sheldon-Trail Summer Jam, a summer high school basketball tournament co-hosted by the two schools.
The inaugural tournament begins Friday and concludes with championship games on Sunday. The field consists of 40 teams from the Sac-Joaquin Section, as well as four schools from Nevada.
“We’re extremely excited that in our first year organizing such an event that we were able to reach our lofty goal of 40 teams, including four teams from Nevada,” Monterey Trail head coach Ken Manfredi wrote in an e-mailed press release.
The 40-team field is separated into eight different five-team brackets for pool play. After pool play is completed on Friday and Saturday, teams will be placed into five tournaments for Sunday’s single-elimination games.
Listed as five separate tournament brackets – Platinum, Gold, Silver, Bronze and Copper – organizers will construct Sunday’s schedule based on pool play results. Teams that win their respective pools will not automatically be placed in the Platinum bracket, considered to be for the elite programs in the tournament.
The goal is to place the top eight teams in the Platinum bracket, and then the next eight best in the Gold. That trend continues until the bracket is filled through the final five in the Copper bracket.
Tournament sites include Monterey Trail, Sheldon, Pleasant Grove High School and Smedberg and Harris middle schools.
Pool play begins at 2 p.m. on Friday, with each team playing a doubleheader that first day. Saturday games begin at 9 a.m. and conclude later that night with the final game scheduled for an 8 p.m. tip-off.
The list of pool play brackets include: Pool A: Sheldon, Roseville, Galt, Del Campo and Antioch; Pool B: Natomas, Del Oro, Ripon, San Juan and Center; Pool C: Folsom, Spanish Springs, Turlock, Burbank and Christian Brothers; Pool D: Monterey Trail, Ripon Christian, Reno, Woodcreek and Dixon; Pool E: Yuba City, Vacaville, Davis, Mesa Verde and Douglas; Pool F: Vista Del Lago, Los Gatos, Merced, Rio Americano and Laguna Creek; Pool G: Fairfield, Incline, Amador, Damonte Ranch and Oakmont; and Pool H: Will C. Wood, Foothill, Granite Bay, Pleasant Grove and Bear River.
Similar to the tournament itself, the Summer Jam game rules are also unique.
The game will be made up of two 20-minute halves, with a 5-minute halftime.
The clock will stop the last minute of the second half if the game is within 12 points.
The last minute of the second half will be played like a regulation game. Each team will be assumed to be in the bonus. On all common fouls, players will shoot one-and-one or two shots. If in the double bonus, shooting fouls will be either two or three shots.
Each team is allowed two timeouts per game.
Except for the last minute of the game, on all shooting fouls, the player will receive one point and shoot one free throw (two points for the free throw on three-point shots). If the player is fouled in the act of shooting and the basket is good, the team will receive three points (four points on a three-point attempt) and no free throws will be allowed.
A technical foul for “unsportsmanlike behavior” awards the other team two points and the ball out of bounds. The player that receives the technical foul must sit out the remainder of the game, unless the technical foul is not due to poor sportsmanship or behavior. Any player receiving a second technical foul due to poor sportsmanship or behavior will be disqualified from the tournament.
If the score is tied at the end of regulation, the first team to score two points in overtime wins the game.
