CHAMPAIGN – Shaun Pruitt wants to leap into the fire. Calvin Brock is content to simmer a while longer.

Illinois whipped Southern Illinois-Edwardsville 78-58 in Friday's exhibition opener at the Assembly Hall, but the story of the night was the divergent paths chosen by the Illini's freshman duo.

CHAMPAIGN - You put the All-Big Ten backcourt on one side in an intrasquad scrimmage, and it's supposed to cruise.

So in the last of three 10-minute Orange and Blue scrimmages Saturday night, an Orange team featuring Dee Brown and Deron Williams — the 2003 and 2004 preseason Big Ten players of the year — should've cruised, right?

Luther Head used a couple of nifty off-the-glass slams to claim Saturday's dunk competition, returning to the perch he earned early in his career.

"I had to go out with a bang," said Head, who topped Roger Powell Jr. in the finals. "It's my last year. I couldn't let them outdo me this year."

The process came to a close late Monday night, when Shaun Pruitt became the first high school basketball player to give an oral commitment to Illini coach Bruce Weber.

"I still haven't called Coach Izzo yet — that's going to be the hard part," Pruitt said. "Once that's done, I'll really be relieved. But I feel good knowing that I'm committed to a school I want to go to and where they want me."

EVANSTON — The mass of cameras and reporters crowding Ron Turner after Saturday's game didn''t get an answer about his job status. But there were hints.

"It's never any easy situation," Turner said. "Regardless of what happens, I'm awfully proud of these guys. I know they're going to be a helluva team in the future."

Once a month, we'll take a look back at memorable Illini moments through the covers of News-Gazette sports sections.

Today: No one graced as many News-Gazette covers as Dee Brown, the face of Illinois basketball while he was helping win Big Ten titles and make NCAA tournament marches.

(The Illinois coaches) told me if they didn't play me both ways they'd be wasting my time," Wilson said. "Once they told me that and I heard it from Ron Zook himself, that helped me to make my decision."

The Chicago Simeon two-way star made it official Thursday night in his high school's auditorium, putting on a blue, orange and white Illinois hat and saying, "I'm going to be a Fighting Illini."

Dave Downey and teammate Bill Small helped recruit Jerry Sloan, a rugged type from McLeansboro who eventually accepted Harry Combes' offer to play at the UI.

Sloan, though, never felt comfortable on campus. Downey, then a sophomore, tried to cheer him up, offering Sloan help with his homework and a room in the Phi Delta Theta fraternity house.