Fresh off a state championship season, Juneau-Douglas High School basketball star Kaleb Tompkins won\u2019t have much time to reflect on his accomplishments \u2014 he\u2019s just earned a scholarship to Warner Pacific University.<\/p>\n
Tompkins signed his letter of intent to play for the Portland, Oregon school in front of his smartphone-wielding teammates, coaches and family on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been dreaming of this since I was a little kid, it\u2019s kind of a dream come true,\u201d Tompkins said after filling out what has to be the most exciting paperwork of his life. \u201cIt\u2019s a stress off my shoulders now, it feels great. It was a tough decision, there were other schools I was looking at.\u201d<\/p>\n
Schools on Tompkins\u2019 short list included Everett and Mt. Hood community colleges and Grays Harbor College.<\/p>\n
Tompkins learned about Warner Pacific on an exposure trip with some of Alaska\u2019s best prep players, including his cousin Guy Bean, who recently signed with Gray\u2019s Harbor College. Dimond High School girls coach Jim Young took the boys to visit schools in the Lower 48 and Tompkins said Warner Pacific\u2019s campus struck him as a great option.<\/p>\n
Warner Pacific is a four-year school, which was important to Tompkins.<\/p>\n
Warner Pacific\u2019s team is also known to compete well in the Cascade Conference and the National Intercollegiate Athletics Association.<\/p>\n
Tompkins said he is excited to be a part of a competitive team and he\u2019ll be so busy with basketball he doesn\u2019t see himself being distracted by the bustle of downtown Portland.<\/p>\n
The 6-foot-5 guard led the state champion Crimson Bears with 529 points on the season, a 17.6 points-per-game average. On varsity since his sophomore season, Tompkins grew five inches in three years but continued to play with the shiftiness of a 6-footer, landing him second-team all state honors his senior year.<\/p>\n
Tompkins is part of a senior class that started playing as youngsters together on Juneau\u2019s Hoop Rats youth basketball teams. He and his self-described \u201cbasketball family\u201d will leave massive shoes for the Crimson Bears to fill. Bean, Tompkins, Molo Maka, Treyson Ramos and Hunter Hickok all leave the team this year. JDHS rosters some great players underneath these five, but the seniors\u2019 chemistry and drive will not be easily replaced.<\/p>\n
Warner Pacific hasn\u2019t indicated how they will utilize Tompkins. In the meantime, he doesn\u2019t plan on doing anything different, just work on his game over the summer to stay sharp for the season.<\/p>\n
Warner Pacific went 24-10 last year, making it to the second round of the NAIA National Championship Tournament where they were a No. 4 seed.<\/p>\n
\u2022 Contact reporter Kevin Gullufsen at 523-2228 or kevin.gullufsen@juneauempire.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Fresh off a state championship season, Juneau-Douglas High School basketball star Kaleb Tompkins won\u2019t have much time to reflect on his accomplishments \u2014 he\u2019s just earned a scholarship to Warner Pacific University. Tompkins signed his letter of intent to play for the Portland, Oregon school in front of his smartphone-wielding teammates, coaches and family on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":427,"featured_media":26021,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":6,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-26020","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26020","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/427"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26020"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26020\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26021"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26020"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=26020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}