HENDERSON, Nev. -- Nate Blue was looking for a point guard to play on his local traveling team, the Elmhurst Answers, that he was running in his native Queens, N.Y.

He was watching some kids play at Broadway Park when he spotted a 5-foot-8 kid with a decent handle. He asked him to join his 17-and-under team.

Charlie Villanueva said "yes." He didn't mention he was only 12 at the time.

"I blended in well with everyone else," Villanueva said with a smile. "I wasn't going to say anything."

It is the anti-Danny Almonte story -- a kid pretending to be a different age but only because he preferred getting beaten around a little bit by older guys, not dominating younger ones. Villanueva admits he was overmatched at times, but he didn't care then and is thankful now.

"I knew the older kids would push me around," he said.

No one is pushing Villanueva around now. He's 17, stands 6-feet-10 and is one of the nation's top high school basketball players. Remarkably, despite his height, he has never lost that handle that first caught Blue's eye five years ago.

That's why colleges around the country are in hot pursuit and why a half dozen NBA scouts descended on Green Valley High School on Wednesday to watch his every move while playing for the Long Island Panthers in the Adidas Big Time Tournament. While some college coaches believe Villanueva will head straight for the NBA Draft -- and those scouts liked him -- he says he will play in the NCAA.

"I'm definitely going to school," Villanueva said after the Panthers, the tournament's defending champion, made quick work of a team from Washington state. "I want to experience college, get bigger and get better."

That's potentially good news for Illinois, St. John's, Seton Hall, Villanova, UCLA and Connecticut -- the schools the Blair Academy (N.J.) player is considering.

The dynamically talented Dominican credits much of his current success to those days playing for Blue's local team. That and the growth spurt that turned him into a big man, of course.

"Nate helped me out a lot as a player," Villanueva said. "I was like 5-8 when I met him and I was scared to play the one, to handle the ball. He said to stay at it even if I made mistakes, don't worry about it, just learn from my mistakes. It helped a lot, because now I have an inside game and an outside game."

Said Blue, "He was always good. I didn't know how old he was, but I saw him and said, 'this kid can really play.'"

Villanueva's current traveling team coach, Gary Charles, has been blessed with this kind of talent before. Although he prefers not to compare players because expectations can get out of control, the similarities between Villanueva and Lamar Odom -- another long, lanky wing from Queens who starred for the Panthers -- are obvious.

"I don't want to say he reminds me of Lamar, but he does," Charles said. "His versatility is the thing. He can do so many different things just like Lamar could do so many different things. He can rebound, shoot the 3, post up, throw passes, get assists."

And win. Villanueva is not some too-cool, obnoxious, pampered prep star. He left the city two years ago to attend Blair Academy to make sure his grades would be in order.

"The first year was hard," he said.

There he teamed up with another top-five player in the senior class, Luol Deng.

Here at the Big Time, Villanueva is determined to win. While attitude and effort can vary in events like this, it won't with this kid. He was a key component last summer when the Panthers captured the championship of the 344-team tournament, and he isn't ready to let someone else take his title. His attitude is refreshing.

"I want to win bad," he said. "I want to say we defended the championship, go back-to-back. This is my last year on the circuit, so I want to leave everything on the floor."

LeBron sweepstakes

Even though he isn't actually playing, Akron, Ohio superstar LeBron James can't help but make history. The expected No. 1 pick in the 2003 NBA Draft, and the subject of an intense corporate recruiting war between Nike and Adidas, is attending the Adidas ABCD Camp this week as a fan.

He spent most of Tuesday hanging around Boston Celtics forward Antoine Walker, an Adidas spokesman and the sponsor of his own Chicago-based traveling team.

But don't think Adidas got too much of an edge with James. Also attending the camp this week, in an historic move, is Lynn Merritt, who is merely the director of basketball for Nike. Merritt paid his way into Durango High School in Las Vegas like any spectator and stayed around James even though he was working on enemy turf.

Where the entire ordeal gets even more humorous was when Merritt ran into Sonny Vaccaro, the Adidas czar. Vaccaro is a 62-year-old Italian who favors hugs and kisses on the cheek instead of merely shaking hands. It doesn't matter who you are, you meet Sonny, you get a kiss on the check.

So when Vaccaro was saying hello to a group of people he knew, and Merritt was standing in that group, Vaccaro hugged and kissed him before realizing who he was. Now he laughs about it.

"I hadn't seen him in 10 years," Vaccaro said. "I don't have anything against him, it's funny."

News and notes

• Miami has picked up a verbal commitment from Caron Clarke, a talented, 6-foot-6 wing from Brooklyn (N.Y.) Lincoln. This is a significant recruit for the Hurricanes. Not only does Clarke have the potential to become a star in Perry Clark's system in South Florida, but it is the first significant New York City recruit for the 'Canes in recent memory. Establishing an in-road in the capital of the Big East is paramount to Miami keeping its surging program headed in the right direction.

• New Florida State coach Leonard Hamilton is pleased with the commitment the Seminoles have made to basketball. Not only is the Leon County Civic Center undergoing some renovations, but the school recently built a $10 million practice facility that rivals the state-of-the-art complex built down the road at the University of Florida.

• South Carolina coach Dave Odom is looking for a big-name opponent to come and open the Gamecocks' new $70 million arena this fall. The 18,000-seat complex is designed after Arkansas' Bud Walton Arena and, despite holding 6,000 more seats than the current South Carolina place, it is built so the last row of the new upper deck is actually closer than the last row of the old upper deck.

• Dan Ruffin, a 5-10 guard from Peoria, Ill., has turned some heads with his play this week. The younger brother of current Chicago Bulls guard A.J. Guyton, Ruffin had 30 points, including eight 3 pointers, in one game Tuesday playing for Ft. Sooy. Thus far, he had been recruited primarily by Northern Illinois, Bradley and Illinois State, but he might get some more attention. "I would like that," he said, "but we'll see."

• Big-time point guard Mustafa Shakur of Friends Central High outside Philadelphia, returned to action with the Hunting Park Warriors after missing a few days with a hip pointer. At the end of a tight game against New York Elite, Shakur showed why he is such a heavily recruited player when he took the game over and delivered the victory. His colleges? "Syracuse, Villanova, North Carolina State, Arizona, Connecticut and North Carolina." At least one coach from all of those schools (except UConn) watched the game, including headmen Lute Olson, Herb Sendek and Matt Doherty.