CLAFLIN, Kan. -- People still make pilgrimages to French Lick, Ind., to see that place where Larry Bird learned how to play his beautiful basketball. You can always spot them. They stare at the beaten rim where he would shoot through driving rain. They gawk at the school gymnasium where he would stay until they threw him out. They stop in the precious shops on the square.

"Here to see Larry Bird?" the shopkeepers ask.

"Why, yes."

"Well, he's not here. Why not buy these overpriced items instead?"

Yes, French Lick is quite the attraction. So, they better get ready here in Claflin. Tourism is about to explode. Because Claflin is where that latest national phenomenon, Jackie Stiles, grew up. In the last two weeks, Stiles scored 32 at Rutgers, popped 41 on Duke, poured in 32 against Washington, and now Southwest Missouri State is in the Final Four, and everybody's talking about basketball's latest wonder.

"Once-in-a-generation-type player," Connecticut coach Geno Auriemma says.

"Plays at a supreme level," Duke's Gail Goestenkors says.

"She's an inspiration," Rutgers coach C. Vivian Stringer says.

Oh yes, they will be coming to Claflin. These folks better get ready. Get some Jackie Stiles T-shirts made. Maybe start a tour. Over here, you can see the basket where she used to shoot 1,000 shots a day, whatever the weather. Over there is the bank, where they paste photographs of Stiles in the window. And over on the other side of town, a half-mile away, is the gymnasium, where Jackie once scored 71 points in a game.

And what do you know? Right here at the school, just walking by, is Pat Stiles, Jackie's father.

"Hello, Mr. Stiles. Here to do a little column about Claflin."

"Well," he says, "if it's about Claflin, it'll have to be little."

III

Small towns create big longing. The closest movie theater to Claflin is a half-hour drive away, the closest McDonald's is a half-hour away, the closest mall is, well, far, far away. The biggest things in Claflin are the Claflin Co-op, which towers over the town, and Miller's, which bills itself as Kansas' largest small-town furniture store.

And here, Jackie Stiles would just shoot, day after day after day, under the high power lines and those gray Kansas skies. Her parents tried to get her interested in other things -- and she did win 14 state gold medals in track -- but no matter what else was happening, she would not stop shooting. Somewhere along the way, Jackie stopped asking herself why. She did love basketball.

"I just loved that feeling of shooting alone," she says.

And, let's face it, what else was there for a girl in Claflin to do?

"You want to know about Claflin?" the woman at city hall asks. "Well, your best bet would be over at the library. But she's closed on Wednesdays."

Get that? She's closed on Wednesdays.

Well, here are a few Claflin statistics:

Founded: 1887.

Population: 600, 616, 650, or 687, depending on whom you ask.

Stoplights: Zero.

Number of restaurants: One, the Pizzatagoe, right on Main.

Number of Tiffany's jewelry stores: Zero.

Number in Jackie Stiles' graduating class: 24.

The most famous person ever from Claflin -- before Jackie, of course -- was Wally Hickel, who was so desperate for adventure that he went to Alaska in 1940 and didn't come back. He was a driving force in making Alaska a state, and Wally eventually became governor.

Wally chased adventure. Jackie Stiles just kept shooting basketballs until every women's coach in America came after her. She still has every recruiting letter she ever got. They fill up two garbage bags.

III

To get to Claflin, you go to Holyrood ("A little city with lots of pride") and then, well, just keep on going. If you hit Great Bend, you've gone too far. This is the heart of Kansas, with all the open spaces and the little gas stations, the wheat fields and the grain elevators. This is where Dwight Eisenhower and Walter Johnson and Bob Dole all grew up, each with their own dreams. This is where young Clark Kent dreamed of becoming Superman.

Yes, people will come -- like they come to the Field of Dreams in Iowa. They will want to see where Stiles learned to play her beautiful basketball. She's as unstoppable a force as anyone has seen for a long time. Rutgers played a whole new defense to stop her and failed. Duke sent three defenders at her and failed. Funny, she's the women's all-time leading scorer in the NCAA, and the nation really didn't notice her.

They do now. She's the story of March.

If she keeps going -- if Southwest Missouri State keeps going -- Jackie Stiles will be the story of the year.

"I can just remember watching her just shoot over and over again," Pat says. Behind the Stiles house is a beautiful basketball court, paved white, with one basket backed by a glass backboard.

"I wondered where she got the energy," Pat says. "She just had this drive inside her. You never really know where something like that comes from. She just would not stop."

Yes, people will come. Things are going to change.