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LAGUNA NIGUEL, CA – I was able to catch four college games – up close and personal – over the first 40 or so hours of the season.

Here are some observations, going backward in my analysis (and sorry for the delay!):

*Syracuse 62, San Diego State 49 (Sunday/USS Midway/San Diego): Coach Steve Fisher’s club was far from the first team to be thoroughly discombobulated by a Syracuse zone defense.

But what was particularly impressive about the fashion in which the Orange’s defense – both in terms of scheme and physical attributes of the athletes playing it – helped keep Jim Boeheim’s team in control all the way in the open air of a tantalizing San Diego Sunday afternoon was in how much time the Aztecs to prep for the Orange zone.

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LAGUNA NIGUEL, Ca. – Any sort of preseason All-American selection is always dicey, at best.

Should the weight of the selection come mostly from the side of “college achievement” or of “potential – what you think a guy will do in the coming season”?

I lean toward the “what a guy has already done” with a dash of “what he is likely to do” tossed into the mix.

I’m presenting 25 players, with five from each of the three perimeter positions and 10 in a combined “post” category, since post play is often so interchangeable for most programs – or something like it.

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CYPRESS, CA – Sunday at Cypress Community College, 24 hours before first “official” day of practice for the 2012-13 season, the first-ever West Coast Showdown Showcase proved to be quite the preview of some of the very best players Southern California has to offer.

As anticipated, three of the standout members of the Southern California Class of 2015 – guards Jeremy Hemsley (La Verne Damien), Kendall Small (Huntington Beach Ocean View) and Stephen Thompson (Torrance Bishop Montgomery) – were in attendance and each was terrific.

Of course, that’s been the case the entire fall at every event that Hemsley, Small and Thompson – teammates on the Superior Athletes travel program – have participated.

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BELLFLOWER, Calif. – For those amongst us who just can’t wait the month or so before the start of the real season gets underway, events like the St. John Bosco Catholic School Showcase will have to do.

And, Sunday, it did quite nicely, thank-you very much!

The host St. John Bosco Braves wrapped up the six-game schedule (one of which junior varsity squads) by cruising past Montebello’s Cantwell-Sacred Heart, 86-64, as senior Isaac Hamilton and sophomore Tyler Dorsey led the way with 26 points apiece.

Full disclosure: I had left the building before that final game.

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GILBERT, Ariz. – High-scoring in-state Pacific 12 Conference football games were being played to the west and southeast of the spiffy Inspire Courts facility where the 14^th Arizona Preps Fall Showcase was held from at 11 a.m. to about 9 o’clock Saturday.

But, for the true hoops-heads among the locals or visitors, even the orgy of touchdowns – and turnovers – and other heroics produced in Tempe and Tucson could not have topped the performances of some of the very best Arizona basketball players just two days for the “official” start of practice for the 2012-13 regular season.

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