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2010 commitment Evan Smotrycz graciously agreed to answer a collection of questions that you guys submitted. I couldn’t ask Evan all of the questions but he managed to answer quite a few. Thanks to Evan for taking the time to answer the questions and I think this feature turned out quite nicely. In other news, Rivals recently named Smotrycz the #3 shooting forward in the class of 2010.

AG2 & JBlair: What made you choose Michigan and what do you hope to accomplish here? What schools, other than Michigan, were giving you major interest?

When I took my unofficial visit it just felt right to me. Not to mention that the system that Coach Beilein has fits me really well. I felt like it was the place where I could maximize my potential. Along with that, there’s the history in the program and the challenge of helping bring the team back to to top of the league. I love the big school feel and the academics are incredible. And who doesn’t love U of M? Everyone I talk to has been a fan for a while. I want to get deep into the tournament each year I am here.

Other than Michigan I was in contact with Syracuse, Notre Dame, Virginia, Providence, Oregon State, Pitt, Vanderbilt, and Washington State mostly.

UMKY: Is there a player in the NCAA that you can compare your game to? Wayward from Butler? Singler at Duke? Hummel at Purdue? They all seem to be similar size.

I feel like I am very similar to Gordon Hayward. I was watching Butler throughout the tournament and Coach was texting me saying that also. We can do a lot of the same things and I enjoyed watching him play.

Brian W: What do think you need to improve on most before you arrive on campus?

I just need to keep getting stronger, the bigger head start I get the more ready I’ll be to help win games. I was at the bottom when it came to weight so there was no where to go but up. Since the season ended I have put on a lot of good weight and am already up to 225.

Continue reading ‘Questions Answered: Evan Smotrycz’

Four star Michigan commitment Evan Smotrycz has graciously agreed to answer a handful of user submitted questions. It’s kind of become a bit of a tradition here to do a user submitted Q&A with at least one signee every year. First with Zack Novak and last year with Darius Morris. It’s a little different than the standard scouting reports and feature stories and helps readers get the chance to know one of next year’s freshmen before he sets foot on campus.

You can submit questions in the comments until Wednesday afternoon and I’ll select a handful to send over to Evan.

Evan Smotrycz’ prep career is coming to a close but the 6-foot-9 forward gave us a quick update before New Hampton’s final home game of his career.

My last home game is Friday. We play Tilton whose is a rival a couple exits south of us. We have had a long solid week of practice, we had a game scheduled for Wednesday but it was cancelled because of a huge snow storm. We have been staying sharp in practice and have really competed. Our legs are fresh and it should be a competitive and fun game for our fans to watch.

We have prided ourselves on not taking it easy in practice. “You are either getting better or getting worse, never staying the same,” our coach tells us. That’s why we feel confident about our position going into the NEPSAC Tournament. The first game is Wednesday. The seedings are not finished so we don’t know who we will play. Winning the tournament would be hard, but not impossible. If we could get that done it would make the rest of the year that much better, knowing we as a team hung up a banner in our gym.

New Hampton lost the game, 82-81, but Smotrycz provided another quick update after the game:

I don’t really know what to say. I guess we just weren’t ready to play the game. We lost by one. It’s disappointing because that’s the last game we get to play at our gym, ever. What I can say is this, the thing that allows you to move past these games mentall, is knowing that you did everything you could to help your team. The tournament starts Wednesday, and I don’t want to look back on the year and say “I wish I played harder”. I know my team feels the same, so we will be ready.

Now that New Hampton’s regular season is over, they shift their focus to the NESPAC Class A tournament. New Hampton received the seven seed, with a 6-8 record in conference play, and will face Winchendon (12-5). It sounds like New Hampton got a bit of a rough draw, as their first round match-up will likely match-up two contenders. The linked article also has a nice breakdown of the other teams in NESPAC Class A which should give you a better idea of the teams that Smotrycz has been facing all year.

New Hampton lost to Winchendon twice in overtime this year, but they won the most recent match-up fairly easily and Smotrycz had 21 points and 8 rebounds. The tournament tips off Wednesday and New Hampton’s game is scheduled for 8PM. The semis are scheduled on Friday with the championship on Sunday.

Rivals’ Jerry Meyer recently answered a question ($) about whether Smotrycz was a comparable player to Florida’s Chandler Parsons. The conclusion was that Smotrycz is similar in build and shooting ability but might not be quite the athlete that Parsons is. Meyer hypothesizes that Smotrycz is ranked correctly but might be one of those players “who overachieves based on his ranking”.

Here’s the second edition of Evan Smotrycz’ commitment diary as well as his numbers through his first four games.

Started off 3-0 before the Thanksgiving break, we beat Bridgton at home, NIA Prep, and The Kiski School at the Prep Showcase. I got some good rest out in Vegas over the break. I was there for a week with my family and some friends of ours. We took the red eye back and I went straight up to school. Thankfully, unlike last year, everyone stayed in shape over the break so we wouldn’t have to start from square one. Even though our stamina wasn’t horrible we didn’t have any time to waste.

We had to travel to St. Thomas More last night, a real tough place to play in, let alone win. We were trailing by as much as 17 at the six-minute mark. We battled back to within one with 11 seconds left. We had a timeout so we drew up a play that ultimately got us a last second shot. It didn’t go in but it was a good look and that’s all we could really ask for. You can’t control everything during the course of the game like poor officiating or whether the ball goes in, only how hard you play and how well you execute your offense and defense. With the exception of a few small stretches we played really hard and ignored the officials. We would have won the game if we took care of the ball, but turnovers killed us.

The good thing that comes from the loss is that we matured as a group. We proved that we don’t give up on the road and we stayed together as a team. Since the beginning of the season we have been calling ourselves a family. Family’s don’t give up on each other, whether it’s a bad shot, turnover, or bad pass we fought through adversity and got better as a team. It’s still early in the season and we have a long way to go, the more we play together the better we will be. We have practice tonight to refine some things then we travel to Winchendon for another tough road game.

Basics
What: New Hampton vs. Bridgton
Who: Michigan commitment Evan Smotrycz
Where: http://www.newhampton.org/tv
When: November 19th, 6 PM EST

Watch Live now

The New Hampton School will be broadcasting New Hampton’s game versus Bridgton live over the internet tomorrow evening. New Hampton features Michigan commitment Evan Smotrycz among a number of other Division 1 prospects. Because video clips are few and far between, this should provide Michigan fans with a chance to see the future Wolverine for the first time.

No live blog, feel free to leave thoughts in the comments.