Basketball recruiting: Melum to Mines

NEWPORT BEACH - Newport Harbor High senior boys basketball star

Tony Melum has signed to continue his career at Colorado School of Mines,

Sailors Coach Larry Hirst announced Friday.

Melum, a 6-foot-6 forward, was a two-time All-CIF Southern Section

performer who helped lead the Sailors to their first outright Sea View

League championship since 1985 as a senior.

He averaged 21.5 points as a senior, three points better than his

average as a junior.

He was named first-team All-CIF Division II-AA as a senior, after

garnering second-team recognition in Division I-A as a junior.

For his career, Melum amassed 1,272 points in 73 games, after missing

the first eight games of his sophomore year with a broken wrist.

Melum, who also recruited by Seattle, UC Davis and Chico State, will

join Coach Pryor Orser’s Orediggers, based in the Denver suburb of

Golden. The Division II school competes in the Rocky Mountain Athletic

Conference. Mines went 5-20 last season and has made just one appearance

in its conference tournament (2001) since 1996.

-- by Barry Faulkner