Before donning Oregon green and yellow, Mallory McGwire and Sabrina Ionescu had a close friendship from their time crisscrossing the country for the Cal Stars AAU club team.

They grew even closer when McGwire — a Reno, Nevada, native — practiced in the Bay Area with the team. She’d often stay with Ionescu or at Cal Stars coach Kelly Sopak’s house. The two Oregon Ducks — along with Oregon State’s Kat Tudor, USC’s Valerie Higgins and Minyon Moore and Washington’s Aarion McDonald — have infused the Pac-12 with freshman talent.

Oregon guard Sabrina Ionescu (20) steals the ball from CSU Bakersfield guard Erika Williams (15). The Oregon Ducks host the CSU Bakersfield Roadrunners at Matthew Knight Arena in Eugene, Ore. on Nov. 28, 2016. (Aaron Nelson/Emerald)

“The Pac-12 is going to be a Cal Stars reunion every time we play,” McGwire said. “It’s going to be really nice seeing each other.

“I think it will be cool to see how each player develops too.”

They have support in the stands too. Sopak tries to catch as many games as he can. He said in the 2016 and 2017 recruiting classes, he’s had more of his players stay on the West Coast.

For Pac-12 teams, that’s a positive. Cal Stars — which won the 2015 Nike EYBL National Championship — remains one of the elite feeders of college talent.

“The league [Pac-12] is so good that it’s hard for kids to justify going away when you can stay relatively close to home,” Sopak said. “And get the competition and national notoriety that they need.”

On elite travel teams, talent levels mean players can grow their confidence and skills. Though Cal Stars practices were a four-hour drive for McGwire, the opportunity meant more than exposure and development. Sopak, who also coached Ionescu in high school, helped McGwire analyze the basketball piece of her college decision as well.

“He does a ton,” McGwire said of Sopak. “I’ve never had a coach like him before. I don’t think I’d be where I am today without him. He’s really transformed me as a player.”

In McGwire and Ionescu, Graves said Oregon signed “two of the best stars.”

“It’s one of the premier programs in the country,” Graves said of the club team. “Premier programs become so because they have talent. It’s nice to see a lot of that talent on the West Coast stay in the Pac-12.”

McGwire and Ionescu both play different positions on the court, but channel the same competitive drive to win, Sopak said.

“Mallory has a hidden fire in her that you don’t really detect right away,” Sopak said. “She just hides it a little bit more than Sabrina does. With Sabrina, you’re going to find out how competitive she is right away.”

Sopak, who founded the club team in 2006, joked that he had to sacrifice his DirecTV NFL package when he recently switched providers, but needed to find a way to watch Pac-12 Network, so he could watch his former players.

He pointed to Oregon, Oregon State and Washington as three programs that have experienced a resurgence, leading more Cal Stars prospects up north than before. He looks forward to seeing his former players when they come through the Bay Area for games at Stanford and Cal.

McGwire said she’s looking forward to seeing former teammates at Pac-12 games this year. But in the meantime, she’s cherishing her conenction with Ionescu.

“Playing with Sabrina for the last two years has really boosted my confidence,” she said. “She made me a better player. I love playing with her.”

Follow Jonathan Hawthorne on Twitter @Jon_Hawthorne

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