Todd Lichti, a former NBA player and Stanford star, was the only freshman in the entire 1980s to make an All-Pac-10 team. Four could make it this year.

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For the first time in league history, four freshmen seem certain to make the All-Pac-10 team. How good is that? In the 1980s, one freshman, Stanford's Todd Lichti, did so.

Ten years, one freshman.

In the 1990s, a mere four freshmen were All-Pac-10 players. Not even Mike Bibby made the team.

But this weekend in Los Angeles, you could make a case that the Pac-10's four best players will be matched in a round-robin: Jerryd Bayless of Arizona, James Harden of ASU, O.J. Mayo of USC and Kevin Love of UCLA.

There has been nothing like this in the history of Pac-10 basketball.

Realistically, they are not freshmen in anything other than academic class rank. Since they were 13 or 14, they have been playing as many as 150 organized basketball games per year. They are basketball players.

They have spent the springs and summers of their teenage years traveling America with AAU teams. They play two games a day, sometimes three. Ten games a week, sometimes 15. They accrued enough Marriott points and frequent-flier miles to vacation, free, at Waikiki Beach.

By comparison, when future NBA All-Star Fat Lever led Pueblo High School to back-to-back state championships in 1977-78, he spent his summers working at the VA Hospital.

"Fat was an hourly employee, doing whatever they asked him to do: mop floors, or clean up some nasty stuff," says Roland LaVetter, coach of those Pueblo championship teams. "Until Fat went on a recruiting visit to Michigan State in his senior year, I don't think he had been on an airplane."

When Lever wasn't working in the summers of his high school years, he would try to play in neighborhood games at the old YMCA or the Salvation Army. He played periodically in pickup games at McKale Center, but UA officials ultimately limited participation (it was basically the only place in town to play against quality competition) by requiring school identification to get on the court.

A generation ago, the term "freshman" had full meaning.

It wasn't a surprise when, as a freshman at Arizona State, Lever averaged a scant 3.6 points a game. He was strictly a sub on a bad team that finished sixth in the Pac-10. He had not played extensively enough to bridge the age gap.

The age gap is no longer a factor.

Twenty-five years ago, during the Pac-10's 1982-83 basketball season — the league didn't even choose an all-freshman team because freshmen so rarely were of consequence — there were just three full-time freshman starters: Cal center Dave Butler, Washington forward Reggie Rogers and Oregon State guard Darryl Flowers.

They combined to average 21.5 points.

This year, the Pac-10 starts nine freshmen. Total scoring average: 118.7

Lever was "discovered" by recruiters at the one organized summer event he ever attended: the 1977 Super Star Camp in San Diego. He was entering his senior year at Pueblo and already had won a state title.

Players are now discovered by the time they are 14. Santa Rita High School sophomore point guard Terrell Stoglin is on the radar of every Top 100 school in America. He is the best guard prospect in Tucson since Lever.

Their teenage lifestyles couldn't be more different.

Stoglin's coach at Santa Rita, Jim Ferguson, estimates that his lefty point guard probably played in close 100 organized basketball games last spring and summer. He played on an AAU traveling team. His high school team has played in California.

"Terrell hasn't had time to get a job," Ferguson says. "If you're a Division I prospect, you probably don't work any more. You work at basketball."

In the off-season, Stoglin's family hired a personal trainer so that Terrell could become stronger. He spent time working out against NBA players at McKale Center.

No one asked for his ID because everyone knew who he was.

Between now and the time Stoglin makes his college debut, in November 2010, he will have played in an estimated 250 more games — those with referees — and possibly 300.

When Bayless was 11, for example, he began to accompany his older brother, Justin, to the gym at Phoenix St. Mary's High School. Bayless didn't watch; he played with the 15-year-olds.

Bayless was bold enough to challenge St. Mary's guard David Lopez, who would play at Kansas State. Former Suns coach and player Frank Johnson began to coach/tutor Bayless when he was 12.

By the time Bayless picked up a basketball at the UA, he had probably played in 800 organized basketball games. A generation ago, Pac-10 freshmen had played maybe 100 organized games.

"If you're a high-profile player the way Terrell is, a lot of doors will open to you," says Ferguson. "That doesn't happen by accident."

In basketball years, a typical Pac-10 freshman is more like 22 than 18.

Which, nowadays, sounds a lot like their scoring averages.