I’ve been out and about the last few days, leaving you with the County Center cuts to ponder. I covered football on Saturday at Dietz Stadium in Kingston – the single coldest day I’ve worked outside in five and a half years. If you are reading this and you’re from Rye or New Rochelle, you may even have felt the chill first hand.

Anyway, I haven’t forgotten hoops completely. I’ve actually been to a few gyms in the last week, and I’ve traded phone calls and e-mails with a number of coaches. Here are a few of my first impressions:

We may see three or four brand new champions. It’s true. Not only is White Plains expected to fade from the gold-ball picture in AA (it has to, right???), but Pearl River, Briarcliff and North Salem will face serious challenges in their classes. In fact, if you include the catholic schools, Maria Regina, which lost all but one starter to graduation, should be challenged for local CHSAA supremecy by Victory.

In Class AA, Ursuline and Lourdes look awfully strong. Mount Vernon and Ossining should be exciting and dangerous teams. I hear Scarsdale is better than people think. And John Jay-East Fishkill will start nearly every game with the best player on the floor.

Class A is tough to call, too. Pearl River returns a strong core that includes Section 1 tournament MVP Kelly Mulligan. But between Lakeland, with Tori Jarosz; Beacon, with Kara Tancredi; and Albertus Magnus, with Alaina Walker, Class A is filled with game-changing players. Those are three of the best players in the section. You also can’t forget about the sleeping giant of the north, mighty Peekskill.

Briarcliff is obviously the champ in B. It is also the favorite to retain all those plaques. But it will not go unchallenged. Sure, Magnus is gone, but Irvington and Nanuet and their great junior classes will almost certainly provide better competition than ever. Briarcliff will need to play just as well this year to win, and if it does it will be every bit the team it was in 2007-08.

Class C will be a whole new ballgame for Haldane without Brittany Shields. But is 6-foot-7 Danielle Fiacco the next force at that level? North Salem not only has her in the paint, it also has a Hall-of-Fame coach in John Lauro. Right now, I truly believe the Tigers are the favorite.

These girls are good. Real good. A couple years back I wrote a story about the remarkable group of 1,000-point scorers and Division I players in the Class of 2006. There weren’t necessarily Cori Chambers types among them, but the depth of the class was startling.

The Class of 2009 isn’t quite there overall, but the top players are all outstanding. Six of them signed with D-I schools: Porsha Postell (Kentucky), Alaina Walker (St. Bonaventure), Sophia Aleksandravicius (Davidson), Caitlynn Moran (Boston University), Maggie Blair (Manhattan), and Shelby Sferra (Quinnipiac), and Bianca Kowgios and Kara Tancredi are still possible D-I players. You also can’t quibble with Postell’s talent; she’s the first player since the aforementioned Chambers to sign in the SEC, the best conference in women’s basketball.

Depth will reign. Depsite all those I just mentioned, the deepest teams will rule. Ursuline has five players 6-foot-1 or taller and nine players will significant varsity experience. Briarcliff has seven players who played on a state championship team, and another who has been the top scorer on two straight state soccer champions. Magnus returns six players from a Class B finalist. Irvington has three junior starters, two of which played as eighth graders, the other as a freshman. Pearl River has four starters back from the Class A champion.

None of those teams I mentioned has more than one Division I-bound player on its roster. They won’t be carried to a gold ball by stars the way White Plains was in 2007, or lifted to an unbeaten regular season the way Mount Vernon was in 2005 when it had four Division I caliber players.

This season will be about the deepest teams – the ones with the greatest resivoirs of talent – winning championships.

Don’t expect to see Section 1 look like this again. Not only will the season miss five full days of play at the County Center. There are more changes to come in the future. Teams will play just 18 games (rather than 20) in 2009-10. Some will play in vastly different leagues inside larger conferences as Section 1 tries to cut down on travel. Expect Rockland schools to play more Rockland schools. Sound Shore schools to play other Sound Shore schools. River towns to stick with river towns.

Realignment is coming. If you’re a devout fan of the nightly battles in League I-A and League III-C, enjoy them while they last.