Watch out Mecklenburg County, there's another great guard developing at Vance High School.
Sophomore Derick Brewer had 30 points in Monday's 64-59 win over Mooresville in the first round of the I-Meck 4A conference tournament. Vance had to rally from 10 points down and the Cougars did so by outscoring Mooresville 25-11 in the fourth quarter.
Brewer had a career-high 36 points in his previous game Thursday - against reigning N.C. 4A champion West Charlotte. He had 20 points against Hopewell in the game before that.
He leads the Cougars (14-10) in scoring at 16.5 points per game.
"We think he's certainly got an opportunity to be one of the better guards we've had," Vance coach Will Robinson said. "He has a scorer's mentality and he shoots the ball at a high percentage."
Up until a few weeks ago, Brewer was shooting at a ridiculous pace, making 52 percent of his 2-point attempts and 56 percent of his 3-point shots.
Robinson said he's "come down to earth" in the past couple of games. Coach, is shooting 48 percent from the 3-point line - for the season - and just a shade under 50 percent from 2-point range really "coming back to earth"?
And we're talking about a guy who is taking most of his shots from 15 feet and out. This isn't a 6-foot-10 center shooting layup after layup.
"He can really shoot the ball," Robinson said. "This isn't a surprise to us. We felt like he had the potential to make significant contributions as a freshman. But about halfway through his freshman year, he hurt his foot."
The 5-10 Brewer is healthy now and looks like the latest top flight guard from a school known around town, at least in prep circles, as Point Guard U.
Vance has one Division I point guard in college now, Marquis Rankin at Virginia Tech; and another on the way - former Vance star Braxton Ogbueze. Ogbueze, who transferred to United Faith last season, will play at Florida next winter.
Another former Vance star, Jacoby Davis, led West Charlotte to a state title last season.
At one time, Rankin, Ogbueze and Davis all played on the same team for Robinson at Vance.
In Brewer, Caleb Davis, Malik Massey and Torin Dorn, Robinson feels he has another strong group of guards to build around. Brewer, especially, looks like he's going to cause opponents problems for several more years.
"People try to be physical with him and deny him the ball," Robinson said. "But the way we play, with four guards, it's hard to do that. It's hard to totally deny all our guards the ball, and all Derick needs is a little bit of space and he can knock it down."
Wertz: 704-612-9716; lwertz@charlotteobserver.com
