UPDATED: Kansas' Bill Self and Iowa State's Fred Hoiberg attended Linn-Mar's boys' basketball game Tuesday night

The recruiting of junior Linn-Mar High School guard Marcus Paige, this is serious business.

Linn-Mar opened its boys' basketball season Tuesday night at Waukee before a big crowd that included a couple of Big 12 Conference head coaches, Fred Hoiberg of Iowa State and Bill Self of Kansas.

Paige had 23 points. His Lions won, 64-52. And the recruitment continues.

Other schools known to be wooing Paige are Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, North Carolina, Stanford, UCLA and Virginia.

R.H. Slaughter of Des Moines was at the game and sent me these observations:

The Lions started out slow, but found their groove in the second quarter.  Being that this was the season opener, both teams had a tough time finding the hoop early on.

 Waukee tried to slow things down on offense, but Linn-Mar started applying pressure on defense to force the Warriors to make bad shots.  On offense, the Lions worked their game plan with good passing and setting up shots from the perimeter for Paige, Montague, and Shane Benton, who scored all 11 of his points in the second half.  That also opened up the lane as well for coach Chris Robertson's crew. 

Paige's jumper looked effortless and smooth from the outside.  He could have camped out all day from 15+ feet and score every time. 

A few sideline bits:  When Hoiberg walked into the gym with his wife, the Waukee student section didn't hesitate by shouting "Freddy, Freddy, Freddy" in his direction.  Hoiberg stops and waves to the section.  They did the same when Bill Self arrived, by chanting "Rock, Chalk, Jayhawk" and "Bill Self, Bill Self!"  Self cracked a smile and shook his head in amazement. 

The Linn-Mar fans got a good chuckle when Paige was on the free throw line.  The Warriors students started chanting "Ashton" and "Demi", as a reminder of the minor NCAA violation that embroiled when the couple met Paige and Josh Oglesby at the UI-ISU football game in September. 

The Mayor was sitting in the Linn-Mar section for the entire game, as Self stood by the wall behind the north basket near the Linn-Mar bench.  At halftime, Hoiberg strolls over and chats up Self until the start of the 3rd quarter.