Does it get any better than this? I don’t think so: a blowout 69-36 win by Aspen High School over Bayfield in the first round Class 3A playoffs at Aspen High School. Buena Vista looms Saturday–there was mumbling in the stands about quick guards and a Buena Vista big man–but for the moment Friday night Aspen hoops was safe and sound.

We have not been to a game , the fiancee and me, since she bought me Valentine tickets to the Nuggets and Spurs at the Pepsi Center last year. I found myself enjoying the smallest things bout the evening: the squeak of sneakers against wood floor, the long black socks on Aspen’s small backup guard, the grim formality of basketball referees everywhere–the way the wave in substitutions or signal a jump ball.

The little things, in other words.

I particularly enjoyed the play of Walker Moriarity for Aspen High, #12 in your scorecard, a player who reminded me of me, with a good bit of court sense to go with all kinds of nonsense. I loved his play because he sensed the possibilities of the game.

No one ever goes to a high school basketball game in a fur coat. I don’t think anyone under 18 goes to see and be seen, but I know of no event in mid-winter quite like a basetball game to tell you something about towns everywhere in America. The Mayor of Aspen was there and also the pretender who would have his head on a platter, but no matter. If you love basketball, life extends precisely 94 feet and no farther.