The 2008 McDonalds All American game tips off on Wednesday!

It's all-star season again basketball fans! The 2008 McDonalds All-American game is set to tip off on Wednesday March 26, at 930pm eastern (630pm pacific) on ESPN and ESPN-HD. The 31st McDonalds game may tip-off a bit later, as there is an NBA game right before it on ESPN, Phoenix visits the Boston Celtics.

According to the tv listings, there will be a repeat at 1230pm pacific (330pm eastern) on Friday on ESPN2. Not sure if this is the Women game or a repeat of the men's game. Festivities are at the Bradley Center in Milwaukee where the NCAA-dramatic-loss tears of the Marquette fans will stain the court ;-)

Here is the official pres release announcing the game, along with the Offiical McDonalds All American website, which is a giant Flash site and plays loud music when it loads, so if you are reading this in the middle of the night, be sure to adjust your speakers volume beforehand, otherwise you'll wake up the neighborhood ;-)


The Rosters
The game will be highlighted by prep hoopster stars like Tyreke Evans, JRue Holiday, Brandon Jennings, Greg Monroe, Samardo Samuels and such.

Super-scout Dave Telep of broke down the field of 24 and also talked about the players left out of the McDonalds game. A couple of players that had committed to Indiana and Kentucky were left out, while Delvin Roe, an Izzo super-recruit was left out on a technicality.

As you may recall, the selections of the players are not entirely "innocent", there are political, regional, racial, and collegiate biases. For example, if a player commits to Duke or Carolina they are more likely to be selected to the game. If a player is "deemed" by the selection cmte to have "issues", they will be left out. And that's just the tip of the iceberg...

But enough time spend in Negative Town, there's also a nicely done page with detailed roster information, and that page is... *drumroll* Wikipedia.


The Conferences
Only two of the 24 players remain uncommitted, which is about right in the post "straight out of high school and on to the NBA draft" era.

North Carolina leads the way with a trio of players, a point guard in Larry Drew (yes, the son of the former NBA and Italian League great), a forward in Ed Davis, and a center in Tyler Zeller. Ole Roy was all over the place, as the three recruits come from California, Virginia and Indiana.

Thad Matta continues to load up the Buckeye Express with yet another center, BJ Mullens, and wing William Buford. Remember the 5/8 rule? Perhaps there should be a rule to limit a school to only two 7-footers every three years ;-) Thad Matta picked up Greg Oden in 2006, Kosta Koufos in 2007, and now BJ Mullens for 2008-2009! Mercy!

UCLA is the other team with two players, super-versatile sensation Jrue Holiday of SoCal, and Riverside wing Malcolm Lee. Is he the next Arron Afflalo, because Chace Stanback isn't getting any PT.

The Pac-10 has a few more players, with USC getting Demar DeRozan, and Arizona speedy Brandon Jennings of Oak Hill. The game is played in Oregon, so the Nike Ducks are abl to "squeeze" in one of their recruits, big center Michael Dunigan.

But the ACC has clearly won this all-star game roster once again, as Wake Forest has Al-Farouq Aminu, Virginia has Sylven Landesberg, Florida State has Chris Singleton, the Pookies have Elliott Williams, and Georgia Tech has supermodel Iman (Shumpert). And of course the UNC trio mentioned above.

The Big Yeast is big in size, but not in recruits! They only have Samardo Samuels (Louisville), Greg Monroe (Georgetown), Kemba Walker (UConnhoun), and Mike Rosario (Rutgers, Mr Jersey paying off). For a 16-team league of high profile programs and coaches, this is not enough!

The SEC is represented by phenom JyMychael Green (Alabama) and the Big 12 by trouble-maker (?) Willie Warren (Oklahoma). The Big Ten is "saved" by Ohio State mentioned above.

And how about the "mid-majors" (aka non-BCS colleges)? Will they get at least one player? Well they did! The Nevada Foxes were able to convice local forward Luke Babbitt (Lorena not included) to stay up!


Don't forget the Other All-star games
There's the 2008 Jordan Brand Classic, which this time will be shown live on ESPN2, instead of hiding on ESPNU, and only getting a delayed repeat run on ESPN2 when everyone forgets about college and high-school hoops. This was a nice touch and kudos to the people who worked to make this happen. You know who you are!

And also the Nike Hoop Summit, under the umbrella of FIBA and USA Basketball. This is not technically an all-star game, although it really is :)