Barton Community College basketball players Mozae Downing-Rivers and Myles Thompson were selected as participants in the 2024 NJCAA Men's Basketball All-Star Game. Barton coach Jeremy Coombs was chosen as one of the coaches for the game.
The game will be played on Saturday, May 18 in Las Vegas, Nevada at Orleans Arena at 4 p.m. MDT.
The two Cougars are the lone representatives from the Jayhawk Conference.
Thompson averaged 14 points and seven rebounds in 37 appearances and 37 starts. Thompson had a breakout national tournament appearance, averaging 20.3 points and 8.3 rebounds. He scored 20 or more points in three of the four games in the tournament. He was selected as a first team all-conference selection, as well as on the all-tournament teams for the Region VI Tournament and the NJCAA National Tournament.
Downing-Rivers averaged 5.7 assists along with a 3.0 assist to turnover ratio this season. With over 400 assists, Mozae ranks third in Barton history in career assists. Downing-Rivers was selected as a second-team all-conference selection.
Coombs, in his third year at Barton, was named conference and national coach of the year. Coombs has won 77 games in this three years at Barton.
The three helped guide Barton to their first national championship, winning every game at the tournament by at least 14 points.
Participants are selected by the NJCAA Men's Basketball Coaches Association. There are 27 players on the roster for the game.
This year’s event had 13 Division I players, nine Division II players, five Division III players fill up the two rosters. Players will be selected by the coaches and separated into teams at a later date.
The coaches of this year’s teams will be all three NJCAA national championship coaches – Jeremy Coombs of Barton, Dillon Hargrove of National Park and Josh Mills of Dallas-North Lake.
This is the 14th NJCAA Men’s Basketball All-Star Game dating back to 2009.