VaPreps Class 4 All-State Hoops Teams for 2017-18

VirginiaPreps.com is proud to release our 10th Annual All-State Basketball Teams.

There are a total of 12 honorees with six players, including a Player of the Year, for First Team and six more on the Second Team.

So what are the factors that go into the choices that are made? All selections are made by me with no consultation of the coaches simply because that’s what the VHSCA and VHSL Teams are designed for in my opinion. However, we try to study individual statistics (some supplied by coaches upon request) as well as factor into the equation team success and overall impact.

Once everything is weighed, we try to blend it all together and make the best choices possible, even though there’s no such thing as a perfect team or right and wrong picks.

It’s never an easy process because there are always many deserving players who don’t get recognized on First or Second Team.

Without further ado, here’s the VirginiaPreps.com Class 4 All-State Basketball Teams for the 2017-18 campaign with information bios on each player . . .

Class 4 First Team:
Dereon Seabron - Lake Taylor - Sr.
Jordan Miller - Loudoun Valley - Sr.
Michael Brown - Handley - Sr.
DeShawn Ridley - Huguenot - Sr.
David Ware - Caroline - Sr.
Joe Bryant - Lake Taylor - Sr.

Player of the Year: Dereon Seabron (Lake Taylor)
Coach of the Year: Kenny Brown (Lake Taylor)

Class 4 Second Team:
Caleb Butts - Deep Creek - Jr.
D'Ago Hunter - Eastern View - Sr.
Josh Moore - Grafton - Sr.
Jordan Richeson - Jefferson Forest - Jr.
Keyshawn Jefferson - Lafayette - Sr.
Anthony Williams - E.C. Glass - Sr.

A 6-foot-6 small forward with guard skills, Seabron regularly produced double-doubles and sometimes even flirted with triple-doubles for a Lake Taylor team that went 26-1 overall and captured its first ever State Championship. In the 72-66 double-overtime victory over Handley, he had game-highs of 24 points and nine rebounds, going 8-of-15 from both the field and the foul line while also handing out three assists.

In the playoffs, Seabron averaged 26 points per game, which included piling up 32 on Heritage of Newport News in the regional semifinals to give the Titans their second State Tournament berth in three years. The Class 4 Region A Player of the Year finished with averages of 22.5 points, 11 rebounds and 4.3 assists per game.

Seabron plans to spend a year of post-grad next season at Massanutten Military Academy. In three years at Lake Taylor, the Titans did plenty of winning, posting a record of 70-10 overall.

Miller graduates Loudoun Valley with a lengthy list of accolades, concluding his career with 1722 points to break the school-record of 1585 set by Chris Leonard in 1988. The 6-foot-6 swingman signed to play his College Basketball at George Mason University made the State Tournament three consecutive years, highlighted by Class 4 State Player of the Year honors and a State Championship as a junior, and led the Vikings to a remarkable 81-5 overall record during that time.

Against a Phoebus team that made the State Playoffs for a second straight year in Class 3, Miller had 33 points on 13-of-20 shooting and 13 rebounds to lead the Vikings to a 71-68 win at the 10th Annual VaPreps Classic. His senior season saw him average 17.8 points per game, shoot 77.6% from the charity stripe (97-of-125) and drill 40 three-pointers en route to claiming Region 4C co-Player of the Year as well as Dulles District Player of the Year.

What a ride it was for Brown, who saw his Handley career began 0-9 when he was a freshman, to scoring all ten of his team's overtime points in their comeback win over defending State Champ Loudoun Valley in the State Tournament semifinals, where the 5-foot-8 senior floor general delivered a buzzer-beater. The Northwestern District Player of the Year and co-Region 4C Player of the Year averaged 14.7 points, 5.1 assists, 4.2 rebounds and 2.6 steals per game as the Judges went 25-4 overall.

Perhaps the most under-appreciated aspect of Brown's play was the fact he shot 58.9% from the floor (165-of-280) and 43.5% on three-point tries (20-for-46) while converting over 71% of his free-throws. With Handley, he finished with 983 career points. Brown will play his College Basketball at Mount Olive, a Division II program in North Carolina.

A 6-foot-6 senior forward set to play basketball at the next level for Wallace State Community College in Alabama, Ridley opened eyes around Virginia with his athleticism and intensity at both ends of the court. For the season, he averaged 20 points, 10.5 rebounds and 3.5 blocks per game while shooting 52% from the field (192-of-367) and 79% from the foul line (108-for-137).

To no surprise, Ridley was chosen First Team All-Region 4B. But what most probably failed to see coming was how he elevated Huguenot's play, where they went 8-2 over their final ten games, reaching the State Tournament Final Four and capturing a regional title for the first time in school history. Ridley had 15 double-doubles, even posting one in their loss to eventual State Champ Lake Taylor with 27 points and 11 boards.

Buzz was back in the Battlefield District and a lot had to do with the improved play of Caroline behind Ware, who averaged 25.6 points and 13.4 rebounds per game. The Cavaliers went from achieving just eight victories the season before to posting a 20-4 record and capturing their first regular season and tournament crowns in the district since 2004.

In a 93-74 win over King George, Ware hit for 51 points - the most by someone in the Fredericksburg area since 1970 - and eclipsed 1000 points for his career. The 6-foot-4 swingman will be spending a year of prep school at Fork Union Military Academy.

In the 105 games that Lake Taylor played while Bryant was on varsity, they won 89 of them. Two of those wins were region titles, but none brought more exhilaration than their double-overtime victory over Handley in the State Championship last March. The Norfolk State University signee averaged 15 points, 7.0 rebounds and 4.3 assists per game on his way to earning First Team All-Region 4A accolades.

There's no diminishing the toughness, hard-nosed style of Bryant and what it meant on the Titans. In the postseason, he averaged 16 points per game with a 33-point outburst coming in their State Semifinal win over Huguenot at the Arthur Ashe Center in Richmond. Bryant went over 1000 points in his Lake Taylor career during a December win over Landstown.

Now 243-161 in 17 years at the helm, Brown knows the anguish his Titans went through at the end of the previous two seasons. They fell to Monacan 57-53 in the State Championship game in 2016 after watching a 12-point second half lead evaporate, then fell the next year to Smithfield 61-60 on a buzzer-beater from beyond half-court in the regional quarterfinals. But this Lake Taylor wouldn't be denied.

Brown pushed all the right buttons as the squad went from good, to title contender, to dominant on their way to claiming the program's first ever State Championship trophy. In going 26-1 with the lone blemish coming to Maury, a team they had beaten in the first encounter 80-65 on the road, the Titans won 23 contests by double-figures. His senior class goes out with a mark of 89-16, better than any other group in Lake Taylor history.

The Hornets have had some wonderful basketball players over the years, high-profile names such as current NBA forward Mike Scott and Corey Law of the Harlem Globetrotters, yet Butts helped the Chesapeake school pull off something that even those immense talents didn't. That is guide Deep Creek to the State Tournament, which the Hornets earned with a regional semifinal win over Denbigh. That marked the program's first State Playoff trip since 1991, when they beat Bayside for the Eastern Region Championship.

Butts was at the center of their success in averaging 22.3 points and 14 rebounds per game while registering a whopping 23 double-doubles. The ultra-consistent 6-foot-5 forward had arguably his best game against Southeastern District rival King's Fork when the First Team All-Region performer poured in 38 points and 20 rebounds.

Pegged All-State in both football and basketball at Eastern View, Hunter really showed his worth this past winter in averaging 22 points, five assists, four rebounds and four steals per game on a Cyclones team that would've been in re-building mode without him. Though he usually stood smaller than everyone else on the floor at a mere 5-foot-7, that didn’t prevent him from venturing into the lane and finishing against bigger bodies on a consistent basis.

This First Team All-Region 4B selection tallied 569 points as a senior to push over 1000 for his career and join Anias Saunders (Radford) as the lone two players in Eastern View history to achieve the milestone. Hunter had some huge outings, such as 32 points in a win over King George, 31 in a victory over Chancellor and 30 in a defeat of James Monroe. He will be headed to Towson to play College Football.

Entering the Grafton program, expectations were fairly high for Moore considering his older brother, Elijah, was a standout that helped them reach back-to-back State Championship games and went on to play on the collegiate level at Virginia State. Josh left his own mark as he led the Bay Rivers District in scoring at 22.1 points per game, one season after averaging 18.5 points per contest as a junior.

Among Moore's highlight performances was when he had 33 points on 11-of-19 shooting with five treys, a perfect 6-for-6 from the foul line and handed out five assists in a win over Churchland. There also was a 32-point outing in a victory over Class 6 Tallwood, helping the Clippers race out to a 10-0 record.

A 6-foot-4 junior wing that transferred in to Jefferson Forest from Alleghany, Richeson had an immediate impact on the Cavaliers. He quickly became their go-to guy, and despite a 2-8 start to the season, he was able to direct them to their basketball program's most memorable playoff run in recent memory.

Richeson, the Seminole District Player of the Year and a First Team All-Region 4D selection, had 39 points in a victory over fellow State Tournament participant E.C. Glass. For the season, he averaged 19 points per game and helped Jefferson Forest win 16 of their final 18 contests to punch their ticket to the State Playoffs.

As the Rams won 18 games, including a 14-0 start to the season, and notched their first ever Bay Rivers District regular season crown, Jefferson gave opponents all kinds of fits. In December, he hit the 1000-point plateau for his career and finished with 1263 points to rank among the most prolific scorers in both the school and district's history.

Jefferson had some monster performances; he put up 41 points right off the bat in a win over Smithfield and dropped 33 points against Tabb a month later. For his senior campaign, the 6-foot-tall guard averaged 19.6 points, 6.0 rebounds and 5.0 assists per game to lead Lafayette to new heights.

Described as the swiss army knife for E.C. Glass, Williams put up 15 points per game and was an indispensable part of his team's attack on their way to reaching the State Tournament quarterfinals. In fact, in their 55-47 victory over Jefferson Forest in the Region 4D Championship game, this 6-foot-3 senior guard/forward put up a game-high 19 points to go with five rebounds and three steals.

The Hilltoppers went 21-6 overall, marking their best season since the 2014-15 group went 26-3 overall, and Williams was a key ingredient. He went from 2nd Team All-Seminole District to First Team All-District and All-Region. Williams will play his College Basketball in-state at Emory & Henry.

*** See VaPreps 4A All-State Teams for 2016-17 Here ***

*** View VHSL Class 4 All-State Teams for 2017-18 Here ***

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