Sitting on the bleachers at Neumann-Goretti High in South Philadelphia, Quade Green shot Dhamir Cosby-Roundtree a quick look. These two seniors are close friends and also the two top high school basketball players in the city — one a point guard headed for the University of Kentucky, the other a power forward signed to join Villanova.

Waiting for practice to start, they were talking about basketball influences. Green had gone through a full catalog of top NBA point guards. Talking about big men important to him, Cosby-Roundtree mentioned LaMarcus Aldridge, now with the San Antonio Spurs.

"What?" Cosby-Roundtree said, noting the look that Green gave him.

That look said: Let's not go too far here, don't B.S. this conversation. Except when Cosby-Roundtree later opened his laptop, got on YouTube, hit the search button, he knew the player he would be looking for first.

LaMarcus Aldridge.

These two teenage ballplayers could know more about the technical aspects of their sport than their predecessors of a generation ago, simply because they have free access to so much of the history of the game on their phones and laptops and iPads. They watch full games, but also study highlights of role models. A free period in school might mean a visit to a personal basketball library.

Any description of a Philadelphia hoops player usually includes drive and grit and work ethic. But there's an underreported aspect, the basketball intellect. These two, Green and Cosby-Roundtree, can break down a play — their own or just some random video — as easily as a graduate English student can break down Shakespeare.

MICHAEL BRYANT / Staff Photographer

Neumann-Goretti’s Dhamir Cosby-Roundtree drives to the basket against Archbishop Carroll. The Villanova-bound big man studies online videos of players from LaMarcus Aldridge to Draymond Green to Hakeem Olajuwon to develop his game.

Their games reflect the work. Veteran Neumann-Goretti coach Carl Arrigale, who has had his share of great ones, calls Cosby-Roundtree the most improved player he's ever had in terms of development from freshman to senior year. Villanova only began looking at Cosby-Roundtree since they were recruiting Green, an early phenom. The afterthought is now 6-foot-8, his motions now fluid and dangerous.

When other schools recruiting Cosby-Roundtree tried to tell him Villanova wouldn't have much of a role for him, the player asked for a meeting with 'Nova's coaches and got it. They explained where he would fit in. Wildcats coach Jay Wright said he walked away from the meeting wanting Cosby-Roundtree more than ever.

"When I finally noticed that I'd gotten way better, I kind of sat back and said, 'Like, wow, it's crazy to see where I came from,' " Cosby-Roundtree said. "I came from somebody who didn't even play. I played outside, but didn't really play in leagues or anything really officiated until the summer of eighth grade.

“I came from somebody who didn’t even play. ... Now everybody’s talking about, ‘Oh, you could be a pro.’ ” Dhamir Cosby-Roundtree

"Now everybody's talking about, 'Oh, you could be a pro,' and stuff like that. Looking at it from that, I didn't want to stop, wanted to keep chasing it, see where I end up."

If Green could give up sleep for basketball, he would do it. He has a tenacity about him, even in conversation. Green is an archetypal Philadelphia point guard in the sense that life is a competition. Text conversations with former Neumann-Goretti greats turn into debates about the best-ever at the school, and how high Green is rising in that conversation. Texts with a top college freshman guard turn into debates about who has the better spin move, the better "hesi", or hesitation move.

Some days, Green sees a Chris Paul highlight on YouTube so he imagines himself as Chris Paul that day. His coach can see it in practice, Green working on something that only he knows. He's not checked out, just in a different place.

Green got up to the Bronx the day after last year's state title game, he said, for one reason. He decided he needed to prove himself as a pure point guard, not just a shooting point guard — get on the highest-level travel team he could find.

"They thought I wasn't really a point guard, that's why I couldn't get that high in the rankings. I had to separate myself," Green said.

How did he do? He led the national circuit in assists, and assists-to-turnovers, and added offers from the likes of Kentucky and Duke.