By the time you read this, at the conclusion of the holiday basketball tournaments for 2010, you will have had an opportunity to evaluate what longtime recruiting analyst Bill "Flash" Flanagan reports is a good-but-not-great crop of point guards in Illinois.

"Point guards are the toughest thing to find, the true point guards, players like Deron Williams, Derrick Rose, Steve Nash, Chris Paul and Jason Kidd," Flanagan said. "Scouts are looking for true point guards, pass-first type kids who are leaders and good distributors, the kind who make everybody else on the floor better than what they normally would be."

"AAU ball doesn't encourage the development of true point guards. It encourages scoring, not pass-first players, which is what a true point guard is. Too many kids think shot first. They think they can be scoring point guards. Only the truly great ones can do that, like Isiah Thomas. Most kids are never going to reach that level."

The first time I attended a holiday basketball tournament in Illinois was when I went to work for the St. Louis Globe-Democrat in 1966. I had heard so much about the Centralia Holiday Tournament and the Centralia tradition that I couldn't wait to make the short trip to see for myself.

I wasn't disappointed. The old gymnasium, named for legendary coach Arthur Trout. The retired jerseys of Centralia icons Lowell Spurgeon, Dike Eddleman and Bobby Joe Mason hanging in the foyer, amid all the trophies, plaques and pictures of championship teams and all-state athletes.

But the most memorable recollection I have of covering holiday tournaments throughout the state for the last 45 years happened at Carbondale in 1967. Tom Parker of Collinsville scored 50 points in the championship game to beat Alton, the most in tournament history.

With all due respect to Proviso West and Pontiac, no holiday basketball tournament is wrapped in more tradition than Centralia. But the event, which was founded in 1943 by legendary coach Arthur Trout, has changed dramatically in the last few years, since I signed copies of my first book, "Sweet Charlie, Dike, Cazzie, and Bobby Joe: High School Basketball In Illinois," in 2004.

It wasn't by design or intent that two of the four names on the cover were Centralia icons. I was looking for one-of-a-kind names that old-time basketball fans could relate to, like Magic, Wilt, Michael and Dr. J. Dike Eddleman and Bobby Joe Mason immediately came to mind.

I attended the Centralia Holiday Tournament for the first time in 1966, as the high school sports editor of the St. Louis Globe-Democrat. As a high school student in Blue Island, a Chicago suburb, as sports editor of the Daily Illini while a student at the University of Illinois, and as a sports reporter for the Champaign-Urbana Courier, I had heard so much about the Centralia tournament and the Centralia tradition that I couldn't wait to experience it all for myself. I wasn't disappointed.

First impressions can be misleading and downright confounding. Like a first date, first chapter, first course, first bite, first pitch or first down.

That's how I felt after watching Simeon's basketball team dismantle Gary (Ind.) Lew Wallace last Thursday night on ESPN.

One game doesn't make a season or a reputation. But I have to admit that I was blown away by Simeon's performance. Honestly, it brought back memories of Thornridge 1972, the best team in state history.

I have to bite my tongue when I say that. I've never put another team in Thornridge's class, not even Quincy 1981 or Collinsville 1961 or Marshall 1958 or Simeon 2007 or Lyons 1953 or Evanston 1968 or Peoria Manual 1997 or Whitney Young 1998.

Is Coach Robert Smith's current squad that good?

James Jackson is back, if only for the Christmas holidays. The former All-State basketball player, who graduated from Crane in 1974, has been living in Australia since 1982. He has returned to visit family and renew acquaintances with old friends and rivals such as Rickey Green, Andre Wakefield, Sonny Parker and Dan Davis.

"People think I'm crazy when I say I appreciate snow," said Jackson, who is making his first trip to Chicago since 2006. "The normal temperature in Brisbane is 70. It's nine degrees right now. I never see snow there. Last night, I walked around the block in the snow and cold weather, like it used to be when I was growing up on the West Side. It's good to see a white Christmas once in a while."

Jackson has made a wonderful life for himself and his family, though it didn't start out that way.

How has the recruiting process evolved over the years?

Let me count the ways.

Thirteen years ago, when I began gathering information on Chicago area football prospects for then San Diego-based Dick Lascola, one of the pioneers in the business of recruiting analysis, I didn't begin calling high school coaches until January and the emphasis was on juniors only.

Those were the good ole days.

The overwhelming majority of high school football coaches in Illinois don't support a proposal to expand the state playoff, to allow more or all teams to participate. Instead, they support a proposal calling for 10 scrimmages in a five-day period in the summer. And the Illinois High School Association is supportive, too.

So you can understand why coaches and IHSA officials were surprised when the IHSA's Legislative Commission recently rejected the proposal and failed to recommend it for a vote by the IHSA membership. Even the IHSA's football advisory committee didn't support it. Look for the coaches to do a better and more persuasive job of lobbying their principals to support the proposal next year.

"The proposal wasn't shot down significantly. It got some support, like 10 for and 20 against," said Craig Anderson, an assistant executive secretary who monitors football for the IHSA. "It is what a lot of coaches have wanted for a long time."

On his first carry as a starter on Maine South's varsity, in the fifth game of the 2010 season against Niles West, Paul Preston took a pitch from quarterback Matt Alviti and ran 54 yards for a touchdown.

On his next carry, he scored on a 58-yard run.

"I was so excited," Preston said. "This is awesome. I know I can play with these kids now. Everyone was going crazy. It was an awesome feeling."

What is so awesome about all of this is Preston, a junior, is only 5 feet, two inches tall and weighs only 122 pounds. Sure, the program lists him at 5-4 and 161. But Preston blushes when those figures are mentioned. He admits to being "right around 5-2 or 5-3." He thinks he weighs closer to 150 pounds than 120. All he knows for sure is he isn't 6-3, 250.

I've known Bill "Flash" Flanagan for more years than either of us cares to admit. He has been coaching and evaluating high school players for more than 40 years and he has worked with some of the brightest basketball minds in the business, including Will Robinson, Bill Chesbrough and Gene Smithson.

So when Flash says a kid is a big-time prospect or is overrated or isn't as good as advertised or is better than any other recruiting analyst thinks he is...well, I take his word for it. His experience counts for a lot. He has been there and seen that.

Flanagan conducted his annual Hoops Review in Morris not so long ago and he observed the 2010 State Farm Tournament of Champions in Washington, Ill., an event that attracted the No. 1 team and the No. 1 player in the nation.

Thoughts of someone who has been observing the state football playoff since it kicked off in 1974 and watched the 2010 finals from an easy chair in his comfortable den on Friday, then spent Saturday taking notes while signing books in the Great West Hall of Memorial Stadium in Champaign:

* Wheaton Warrenville South is as good as advertised but not as good as coach Ron Muhitch had projected prior to Saturday's 28-17 victory over Lake Zurich in the Class 7A final. The 2010 Tigers aren't as good as John Thorne's high-scoring 1998 WW South powerhouse that was led by quarterback Jon Beutjer (national-record 60 TD passes), wide receivers Jon Schweighardt and Eric McGoey and running back Corrice Burns. The Tigers averaged 44 points per game and crushed Barrington 42-14 in the state final.