After a couple of years at Waterbury's Crosby High, the Greater Hartford Pro-Am officially returns to ... well ... Hartford on Wednesday night. Games will be played at the Sport & Medical Sciences Academy at 208 Huyshope Ave. in Hartford.

The GHPA's 2015 season kicks off at 6:30 p.m., with Attorney Deron Freeman (led by Tobin Carberry and a host of players from Central Connecticut) facing Pauly Chute Slamm (which will be led by a pair of terrific New Haven guards past and present -- Bobby Moore and Tremont Waters. Waters, a UConn target, won't be at Wednesday night's game. Stanley Robinson is also on the team).

At 8:15 p.m., New York's Hot 93.7 (last year's scoring champ Doug Herring, Anthony Cox) will face two-time defending champion BJM Law Firm (Ryan Gomes, Keith Cothran, Lamonte Ulmer, Kelvin Davis).

Other top players expected to compete in the 11-team league include Jerome Dyson, Doug Wiggins and A.J. Price. The league could get some special guest appearances: on Aug. 1-2, Nate Robinson is expected to play. Other possible players throughout the summer could include Andre Drummond, Rudy Gay, Kemba Walker, Jeremy Lamb and Wes Matthews.

And, as always, several current UConn players are expected to play throughout the summer.

I don't normally get too into this kind of stuff, but this was sent to me on Twitter, and it's pretty cool.

Personally, I think No. 2 (the dunks by Lamonte Ulmer and the alley-oop between the Saunders brothers) should have been No. 1. Also thought Bobby Moore's great move at No. 7 should have been higher, but maybe that's some New Haven bias.

Anyway, here are the top 15 plays of the Greater Hartford Pro-Am this summer, in a well-done video:

The Greater Hartford Pro-Am kicks will have a new look to it when it begins play on July 10.

For one, the league -- for a variety of reasons -- will be based at Crosby High in Waterbury this year.

There will be a few new teams in the league, as well, including one entered by Andre Drummond. The former UConn and current Detroit Piston standout will be put in his own team, according to league co-founder/CEO Peter Higgins, and Higgins is hoping Drummond may bring some of his new NBA friends (like Brandon Knight, etc.) to play from time to time.

Also, the perennial powerhouse team from Waterbury run by Ryan Gomes and Wayne Simone will be split up. Gomes will run with his New Haven buddies, Keith Cothran and Lamonte Ulmer, while Simone will coach a team with some younger players.

Higgins is also trying to get a Bridgeport team in the league, though that's not a done deal yet. There will be three Hartford-based teams, as well as Cambyland and the Springfield Slamm. The Slamm has Jeremy Lamb on its roster and hopes to have two or three of UConn's incoming freshmen (Amida Brimah, Kentan Facey and Terrence Samuel) as well. The frosh are only likely to play on weekends, however, since UConn's freshman summer program has 7 p.m. study halls Monday through Friday.

The league is slated to begin July 10 (though there may be a game or two before that date).

Here's a feature I wrote on Tharon Mayes, the former New Haven high school star who went on to a successful career at Florida State, then Europe.

Why am I putting a story on Mayes on a UConn blog, you ask? Well, a quick look at his surname and you may be able to surmise that UConn fans may be very interested to hear what Mayes has to say.

Mayes is the father of Xavier Rathan-Mayes, the highly-touted Class of 2013 shooting guard who is a big-time UConn target. (Actually, Mayes is Xavier's stepfather -- he met Xavier's mom, Marilyn, when Xavier was about five).



According to Mayes, Xavier attended Cheshire Academy four years ago, as detailed in a nice story by the late, great Dave Solomon, but is now at Huntington Prep in West Virginia). Among the six schools he's "fond of", according to his dad: Florida State (Mayes's alma mater), UConn, Baylor, Alabama, Memphis and UCLA. There are others, as well. I apologize if I made it sound earlier like he had pared his list down to just those six.

Rathan-Mayes, who has made unofficials to both UConn and UCLA already, plans another unofficial to FSU sometime over the next couple of weeks. He'll narrow down his visits after taking the SAT's in September, according to Mayes. Xavier would like to commit early in November.

Tharon Mayes said that Jim Calhoun's coaching future is "a concern. He likes Kevin Ollie. Kevin’s been speaking to him, it’s definitely a school of interest. But that is something that’s a little scary.”

Here's what Tharon says about his son's game: "He can definitely stroke it. But I think, with him, what makes him tough is he plays both guard spots very well. It adds more to his game than him being a pure point guard or two-guard."

*** Meanwhile, Joey Natale of UConnBall.com caught up with Reggie Cameron after his visit to UConn on Tuesday. Guess what? The visit went "great."

*** Oh, and in the GHPA playoffs: Doug Wiggins had a triple-double (40 points, 10 boards, 10 assists) to lead Recycle Kings to a 152-145 win over Harte Nissan in Game 2 of the championship series. The decisive Game 3 will be tonight (Thursday) at 7 p.m. at Classical Magnet School.

UConn target Kuran Iverson added 36 points and eight rebounds and Jerome Dyson 30 and 11 for Recycle Kings.

Ryan Gomes had 34 and 10, Lamonte Ulmer 28 and 12 and Keith Cothran 27 and seven for Harte Nissan.