Once every week or so, Phil Judson drives from his home in Gurnee to Waukegan and visits the old head coach from the 1952 boys basketball state championship game in which he played.

The game was momentous because Judson’s team, Alden-Hebron, defeated Quincy, 64-59 in overtime, becoming the smallest school ever, 98 students, to win the state title under the IHSA’s old one-class system.

But the coach Judson visits is not Hebron’s Russ Ahearn, who died in 1994. It is 98-year-old George Latham, who was in the University of Illinois’ Huff Gym on March 22, 1952, on Quincy’s bench.

“We talk basketball,” Judson said. “We never run out of anything to talk about.”

Judson took his twin, Paul, Bill Schulz and Ken Spooner, the four living starters from Hebron’s team, to visit Latham this week. Hebron will celebrate the 60th anniversary of the 1952 team at Alden-Hebron High School today from 2 to 5 p.m. The “A Taste of Hebron” brunch will start at 12:30 p.m. in the cafeteria for $12 a person. The celebration from 2 to 5 is free.

There were several ties between Hebron and Quincy in the years following that game. The Blue Devils’ star player, Bruce Brothers, played with Phil and Paul Judson at the University of Illinois. Later, Phil coached at North Chicago and Brothers coached against him at Waukegan.

“I like it [when Phil comes over],” Latham said. “It’s great. It has bearing on the game in ’52. Phil is a great guy, and the other kids too. Their players were doing the best to win and so were my players. And so was I and so was coach Ahearn.”

Judson is recording the conversations with Latham, who asked him when he was going to write a book. He says they discuss segregation and lots of Illinois basketball history.

“There’s so much basketball history out there,” Judson said.

Macular degeneration limits Latham’s eyesight, and he lost part of one of his legs, but his mind is sharp and he enjoys watching basketball games on TV – he just has to sit closer than he used to.

“We talk about how the game was 60 years ago,” Latham said. “Basketball has changed a lot since then. We talk about players, coaches, teams, how some of the rules are different.”

Latham got out of coaching when he came to Waukegan as an administrator in 1956. He retired in 1980. Judson cherishes the chances for the two to talk about the game they love.

“Just because we were on different sides in that game doesn’t mean you can’t be friends afterwards,” Latham said. “We have pretty good gabfests.”