Hoop musings ... boys

There is a consensus among the First Region coaches that Graves County and Paducah Tilghman remain the favorites.

"There are those two teams, and then a bunch of us in a pile," Marshall County coach Gus Gillespie said on Saturday night, after his Marshals edged Fourth District rival Calloway County.

Presumably, Gillespie puts both Marshall and Calloway in the "pile," and it's safe to say that teams like Heath and Carlisle County belong there. Mayfield could, too, if leading scorer Xavier Shelton had been allowed to return to the team — he was suspended after the Cardinals finished playing in the Paducah Tilghman Christmas Tournament and later dismissed from the team.

"It was a tough call," said Mayfield coach Chris Guhy said, who said that Shelton was guilty of "inappropriate behavior in practice."

• Tilghman hosts Graves on Saturday night, the first of two regular-season match ups between the favorites.

The Tornado's close loss at Christian County, generally ranked as a top-10 team, was a quick start out of the gate, but the Tornado has been plagued by inconsistent effort and performance since then. Tilghman went 2-2 at the Centralia (Ill.) Holiday Tournament, turning in a somewhat listless effort in a first-round loss to a Cahokia club that came into the tournament with a 4-4 record but won the tournament.

Even so, you have to remember that several key players — including starters Josh Forrest, Kris Jackson and DeJuan Edmonds — are only now a month removed from Tilghman's surprise run to the Class 3A state championship.

Graves comes into the game on a roll, having won the Beach Blowout tournament at Fort Walton Beach, Fla., routing the host team in the title game. Center Ryan Vogt had three double-doubles in as many games and was named the tournament's Most Valuable Player.

• Heath is the No. 1 seed in the All A Classic First Region tournament, with Carlisle County at No. 2, followed by Murray, Fulton County, Mayfield, Ballard Memorial, Fulton City, St. Mary, Hickman County, Community Christian and Reidland. The tournament starts on Jan. 16 at Graves County's Eagles' Nest, with both the boys' and girls' championship games scheduled for Jan. 23.

It didn't necessarily surprise Community Christian coach B.B. Kendrick, who has been the First Region representative on the All A Classic state board since the tournament's inception — but it did some of the area's coaches.

"Every year, we vote on the pre-season top five teams and top five players (for release on the tournament's Web site," Kendrick said. "Heath wasn't in our top five."

The seedings were determined by Litkenhous Ratings, which were released on Monday. The first girls' Litratings will be published later this week, and those will determine the seedings for the girls' regional tournament.

It's Heath's third time as the top seed — the Pirates were upset by Ballard Memorial in the quarterfinals in 1993 and won the tournament as the favorite in 2005. Traditionally, the top seed prevails about half the time, 11 times in 20 years on the boys' side.

• The First Region got maybe its worst draw ever in the All A Classic state tournament, meeting the 15th Region in the first round. That is the home of All A Classic favorite Shelby Valley, which won the small-school state title last season and returns star point guard Elisha Justice — he is expected to walk on at Louisville but has also gotten an offer from West Point and may get some more mid-major scholarship offers over the next few weeks.

Lyon County and University Heights look like the two best teams in the Second Region, and either of them would likely face a tough first-round draw in Richmond. Lexington Christian is the 11th Region favorite and stunned Scott County last weekend.

• Massac County's Superman Classic will hold its seeding meeting on Wednesday, and the tournament looks to have one of its stronger fields in recent years. Murphysboro is undefeated going into tonight's game with archrival Carbondale and appears to be in line to grab the top seed, and Madison (from the St. Louis area) is considered one of Illinois' top Class A teams.

Also in the field are three Kentucky teams — Paducah Tilghman, Marshall County and Calloway County — and southern Illinois entries Massac, Carbondale and Vienna. It wouldn't be a stretch to say that seven teams might have a legitimate chance to win the tournament.