Busting Brackets
Fansided

North Carolina State Basketball: Wolfpack Grabs Five-Star Point Guard Dennis Smith Jr.

By James Fitzgerald

facebooktwitterreddit

NC State Wolfpack head coach Mark Gottfried had his sales pitch together on the opening day of the fall recruitment period.

More from NC State Wolfpack

He was able to land the top point guard prospect for 2016 in five-star player Dennis Smith Jr. out of Fayetteville, North Carolina.

Grabbing Smith takes care of NC State’s point guard situation for the future after current point guard Anthony “Cat” Barber is gone from the program. Barber is going into his junior season this year.

According to espn.com’s Paul Biancardi, Smith chose the Wolfpack over Kentucky, Wake Forest, Louisville, Duke, and North Carolina.

NC State was always seen as the front runner to grab Smith, who has always been an NC State Wolfpack fan. In the espn.com piece, he talked about how Mark Gottfried won him over in their visit.

"“Growing up an NC State fan, I knew they would be one of my top schools. Coach [Mark] Gottfried made me a priority, showing up, sitting in front to all my games in the live periods. That loyalty meant a lot to me. After giving the decision a lot of thought, we all felt State was the best situation for me.”"

The 6-foot-2 Smith, who averaged 21.8 points at Trinity Christian in Fayetteville, is viewed as the top point guard prospect of the 2016 class and ESPN’s No.4 overall high school prospect in the ESPN 100 list.

Smith is currently recovering from an ACL tear that he suffered at the adidas Nations camp in August.

He is going to be out for the next six to nine months after undergoing surgery on August 7th.

Dennis Smith Jr. sounds real optimistic about his recovery and is eager to get back out on the floor.

"My recovery is going great.  Actually, it’s going a little faster than expected. I just went from walking with two crutches to walking with one crutch, and my knee is starting to bend … I am excited."

So now Mark Gottfried has his future backcourt taken care of with Smith committing to NC State, and shooting guard Maverick Rowan reclassifying to play for the Pack’ this year.

Dennis Smith Jr. is everything you would want in a young point guard.

He is quick and explosive to the rim while being able to create scoring opportunities for himself and others.

When he gets healthy and enters ACC play he could end up becoming the best point guard in the conference when it is all said and done.

Mark Gottfried has to feel really good about the direction of his hoop program considering that he has had his team in the NCAA tournament four years straight and he is attracting top talent to Raleigh.

More from Busting Brackets

Home/NC State Wolfpack