The Capital City's annual, bountiful buffet of holiday basketball goodness will tip at 2:30 p.m. Thursday with the opening game of the girls State Farm Invitational at Rackers Fieldhouse --- Jefferson City vs. Quincy, Ill. --- and will conclude with the championship game of the boys Joe Machens Great 8 Classic at Fleming Fieldhouse at around 8:30 p.m. Saturday.

To put it another way, 24 games in 54 hours. Or, based on 80-minute games, roughly 34 hours of basketball in 54 hours.

That would be getting stuffed. But even more than quantity, these tournaments are about quality.

"You've got good teams all the way through," Lady Crusaders coach Alan Lepper said of the girls event at Helias. "There's not an easy team on either side of the bracket."

Both tournaments are all about quality --- both on and off the court.

"When you're a coach and you just show up, you never realize the amount of people who are behind this," said Lepper, who's a part of the expansive tournament committee. "The businessmen and the businesswomen who give their time and their effort for it, it's no wonder it's a class-act tournament, because the people who run it are class-act people."

You'll get no argument from first-year Jays head coach Mark Anderson.

"It's a big event for our community and our basketball program," Anderson said. "The excitement, the buzz that's in the air, the amazing players that come through here ... it's just an awesome event.

"Obviously, there are a lot of holiday tournaments out there, but the things we do for these kids --- the brunch and all the other festivities --- and the caliber of teams, it's just a first-class event, all the way around."

The Jays hope they can stick around, for a change, as they've been more than gracious hosts for a long, long time. Jefferson City hasn't won this tournament since 2005; it hasn't even won a first-round game since 2009.

That's hard to believe.

"I have to believe that there's a little bit of the mental part for them,"Anderson said, "just because of how many times I've heard it. 'How long has it been since you guys won a first-round game?' The kids have to have heard that, too.

"But certainly, we're going to try and make it feel like it's just another basketball game, it's the next game we play."

That next game is at 7 p.m. Thursday when Jefferson City (6-0) squares off against Craigmont (9-4), a team from Memphis, Tenn.

"They press you up and down the floor, they trap you in the half court ... they're a load," Anderson said. "I peaked around a little bit on our side of the bracket, and it looked like the combined record (of the four teams) was 25-5."

The Jays have gotten off to a sizzling start --- so good, in fact, it's surprised even Anderson.

"We're obviously happy with where we are, but I don't think any of our coaches saw this coming," he said. "We didn't have a great summer and we didn't have a fantastic preseason. But once we got our guys together the first couple weeks of practice, we did notice they were bought in, and we did notice that they were clearly getting better day by day and week by week."

Jefferson City's opener follows a bout between the Helias Crusaders (5-1) and Owasso (Okla.) at 5:30 p.m. Conversely at the State Farm, the Lady Crusaders (2-5) --- who have won two of their last three --- will meet Eureka at 4 p.m., as they follow the opener for the Lady Jays, who are the defending tournament champions.

"We started off slow," Lepper said, "but the last three ball games, we've been very, very competitive. I knew with all of the kids we had in fall sports, it would be a while before we started jelling.

"But we're starting to play some pretty good basketball right now."

Lepper had one final message --- come out and get your money's worth.

"I don't know what else you could ask for," he said, "because you can watch a lot of quality basketball games in one day."

And you can do it three straight days.

JOE MACHENS GREAT 8 CLASSIC

DEC. 28-30, FLEMING FIELDHOUSE

FIRST-ROUND GAMES

THURSDAY

4 p.m. --- Raytown South vs. Hyde Park (Ill.)

5:30 p.m. --- Helias vs. Owasso (Okla.)

7 p.m. --- Jefferson City vs. Craigmont (Tenn.)

8:30 p.m. --- Father Tolton vs. Upper Arlington (Ohio)