Prospect Spotlight: Breya Cunningham 2023
The La Jolla Country Day Torreys are widely considered one of the best teams in the entire country, perhaps even No.1. Oregon commit Te-Hina Paopao is one of the best players in the nation and the engine that powers the…
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Continue ReadingThe La Jolla Country Day Torreys are widely considered one of the best teams in the entire country, perhaps even No.1. Oregon commit Te-Hina Paopao is one of the best players in the nation and the engine that powers the team.
But much of their potential success this season lies perhaps with newcomer Breya Cunningham.
Cunningham is a freshman, barely in her first year of high school basketball. She’s been in the starting lineup since day one, and an immediate contributor to the team’s good start. She’s fit in well with an already established unit and admits that she had to make a bit of an adjustment to the high school level of play.
“I guess I just got to get used to how fast high school basketball is,” Cunningham told Prep Hoops. “It’s a lot quicker and the shot clock changes a lot of things.”
It’s been a smooth adjustment for Cunningham, however. She’s given the Torreys an added dimension that they didn’t have before. She’s a very mobile player in the post who can establish position well, something of a lost art among players today.
She’s got good hands and she can finish strong at the rim. Given her size and quickness, there aren’t many players in high school that can match up with her. She gives a lot of teams problems with her length and ability to score in the paint.
It’s that post presence that she’s looking to add to the Torreys to make that much more of a formidable team.
“Last year, before I got here, they didn’t have a big,” Cunningham said. “So when I got here we were able to run a lot more press and match up better with other teams because of the height difference.”
Part of the reason that Cunningham has been able to make such a seamless transition is because she played with the San Diego Waves this summer on the AAU circuit. The Waves are coached by Torreys head coach Terri Bamford and the team is comprised of many of the same players from La Jolla Country Day.
It’s incredibly beneficial for the team that they not only play together in the regular season, but they play together in the summertime as well. It helps them build cohesiveness and team chemistry.
“San Diego Waves is basically the same team, it helps build chemistry with this team,” Cunningham said. “It helps us play better in the regular season.”
Although she is still a young player, that hasn’t stopped Division 1 colleges from noticing Cunningham’s budding talent. She’s heard from a few schools already, and she currently holds offers from San Diego State and Texas.
It’s still going to be a while before Cunningham narrows down her list, let alone choose a school, but she has a preliminary list of what she’ll be looking for in a school.
“A school that has a lot of support, where they don’t have empty games,” Cunningham said. “And a school that has a good education, that’s probably one of the biggest ones.”
Like the majority of young players, Cunningham has a few things she’d like to work, areas of her game she wants to improve on as the season progresses. A lot of players mention the offensive end in terms of how they want to get better. But for Cunningham, it’s a little bit different.
“I want to get better and learn how to be a better teammate for my team,” Cunningham said. I also want to get better with moving quicker with my feet and being able to guard not just the post, but out on the wing more too.”