Fenwick point guard Mike Smith committed to Columbia yesterday, per Verbal Commits. Coincidently, the Tribune reported today that Smith came in second to Charley Moore in the voting for Illinois Mr. Basketball. Matt Chastain was 10th.

We were the first to offer Smith, and I thought we had a good chance at signing him since his coach at Fenwick is former Rambler assistsnt Rick Malnati. Smith reportedly scored 30 on his ACT, and it appears academics played the deciding role in his college choice. Good luck to him.

We do need a point guard to back up Clayton Custer.

Can never fault a kid for going to an Ivy. A 30 on the ACT is good enough for that? For some reason, I figured you'd have to do even better. I don't think my brother wants to pay for his daughter to go to an Ivy so I won't tell him she might qualify.

Is Custer the only PG you have on the roster for next season?

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The Roundhouse

Amen and kind of.

I believe Skokna, our Croatian recruit, is billed as a combo guard and Richardson is IMO a capable 2nd/3rd option is Custer is out for a prolonged period of time. It would be nice to add another PG though.

Smith is the kind of student/athlete we should be getting. We need to sell ourselves as a Midwest Ivy. Last years freshman class had an average 27 ACT. We were ranked a top 100 school by US NEWS and our athletes graduated at the 3rd highest rate above Northwestern. We have 85,000 alums in the Chicago area. Basketball, academics and your future should be our calling card. This is the way NU is pulling themselves out of the bottom of the B10. I think Chastain has an offer from Penn and Krutwig from Columbia....We need to go head to head with these guys.

Amen to this too. We lost Boudreaux from lake forest last year to Dartmouth right? There has to be some happy medium closer to the ivies than say "other schools"

Not surprised by this, but I agree we need a backup PG. I think Custer will be a good player, but we can't forget that he has 69 total minutes of D1 experience. We'll probably need to have a little patience.

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MBB Scholarship Chart

Boudreaux was a Dartmouth legacy as both his parents went there, if I remember correctly.

Mike Smith wouldn't have been admittted to Columbia with his 30 ACT if he was captain of his Fenwick chess team instead of a first team all state basketball player. I believe all the Ivies lower their admission standards for athletes; but they still have relatively higher standards for their student athletes than the run of the mill D1 school.

30 on the ACT is nothing to shake a stick at though.

Smith is within acceptable ACT score for regular students at Dartmouth

Jun 25, 2015 - For those of you who may not recall, “mean” in this context is the average. The average ACT score for an incoming freshman at Dartmouth is a 32, and the middle 50% of incoming freshmen received between a 30 and a 34 on the ACT.

Smith is going to Columbia, not Dartmouth. Columbia is a little more selective, with average act scores 32-35.

I should have qualified my claim that Smith wouldn't be admitted but for basketball. But I think the odds would be against him.

I'm a little surprised the lower range of acceptable act scores at Ivy League schools is as low as it is. My pair of treys was a better hand than I thought.