Amid Hoops and Hype, Twins Dwarfed Delaware

For $65 a ticket, those attending last week’s Slam Dunk to the Beach tournament saw more than four days of morning-to-night high school basketball.

There was a halftime performer who strapped four mannequins to his body and performed a mock line dance.

There was a four-foot-high remote-control blimp that hovered over the court advertising pizza.

And in a corner of the Cape Henlopen High gym, a band called Cheers butchered with impunity music by both Sheryl Crow and the Rolling Stones.

Then there were the Collins twins.

Although not part of the off-court entertainment, the brothers from Harvard-Westlake caused just as much of a sensation as Christopher the line dancer and all the other hype.

As Jarron and Jason ambled through the crowded high school hallways between games, fans gawked openly--and upwardly--at their 6-foot-11 frames. When the teenagers tried to scout their opposition by slipping into the stands, they spent much of their time signing autographs for admirers.

And when they were on the court, fans shouted again and again to the rest of the Wolverines--who are ranked No. 1 in The Times’ regional poll and 12th in the state by Cal-Hi Sports--to get the ball to the twins.

“Just having them here adds to this tournament,” said tournament director Bobbie Jacobs, who paid their way--and that of the entire Harvard team. “They are national talents. They are going places.”

Jacobs, standing courtside in the closing seconds of a game, had to cut his comments short. The Collins brothers had just led Harvard to victory over New York City’s Bishop Loughlin, securing a third-place finish for the Wolverines. And Jacobs wanted a snapshot of himself flanked by the twins.

The excitement over the juniors from Granada Hills extended onto recruiters’ row, the long table set up at courtside for college coaches. In a gym full of lanky young men, the recruiters all noticed when Jarron or Jason--the tallest players in the tournament--would climb into the stands. And when the boys took the court, the recruiters were busy scribbling comments in their note pads.

“Every recruiter in this place is drooling over these boys,” said the assistant coach of one prominent university who spoke anonymously to avoid running afoul of NCAA regulations. “This will be the first time I see them play. But they are one of the reasons I’m here. . . . Now, which one is which?”

Jason, wearing No. 32, is about 20 pounds heavier than his brother, Jarron, who wears No. 31. They play very different games, with Jason preferring to muscle around underneath the basket and his brother playing a more flashy game that includes quick dribbling and outside shots.

Back at home, they are different personalities to their parents, Paul and Portia, who were not expecting twins until halfway through Portia’s delivery.

Both serious students, Jarron is the neater of the two. In Jason’s room, one has to blaze a path through the strewn clothes.

“I can’t tell them apart,” admitted Betty Smith, a retiree from Bethany Beach, Del., who passed her program to Jarron for an autograph. “But I have one signature and I want to get the other one. They’re going to be worth something some day.”

Leo Da Costa, a 6-foot-1 Harvard guard, discovered just how obsessed some fans were with the Collinses when he raced down the court for an easy layup in Harvard’s first game, against Baltimore’s Dunbar High. There were angry shouts from some spectators who would have preferred that he dish the ball off to a twin.

When one twin did have the ball, onlookers wanted to see it remain in the family, with Collins-to-Collins passes drawing thunderous applause.

Harvard Coach Greg Hilliard says the brothers have a special chemistry that improves their game. Their father says they ought to play well together--they have been practicing on the same court since the age of 6.

But others attributed their success on the basketball court to the hard-to-grasp fact that these huge ballplayers 17 years ago were the very same tiny zygote.

“He didn’t even look,” a woman in the stands yelled in amazement when Jason passed to Jarron. “Those twins have something telepathic going on.”

And when the twins managed to set each other up for dunks against Bishop Loughlin, another fan shouted out.

“Loughlin doesn’t have a chance,” he said. “They’re getting ‘twinned.’ ”