Cardinal ruling
Manhattan native Ryan picks Stanford
THE decisions were difficult. The reasoning behind them wasn’t. Cormac Ryan wanted to play high-level college basketball. He wanted to be a part of March Madness one day.
And so the Manhattan native made tough calls. He left his high school and his hometown behind after his sophomore year. He switched AAU programs. All so this day could be possible. “I definitely have goals, and especially for basketball, those broad goals have been motivating me since I was a little kid,” the fourstar point guard who attends Milton Academy (Mass.) said in a phone interview. “I always wanted to play college basketball. I grew up watching the NCAA Tournament. We’d have March Madness get-togethers with my family.
“I have approached the big decisions in my life with open eyes. I haven’t been close-minded in saying no.”
On Sunday, the 6-foot-5 sharpshooting junior guard verbally committed to Stanford, picking the Cardinal over Yale, Michigan, Notre Dame, Villanova and Northwestern, he told The Post. Ryan visited each school on his list, and said he was impressed by each program. But Stanford, he felt, offered the best combination of academics and bas- ketball — Ryan has a 3.6 gradepoint average at Milton Academy — along with an opportunity to make an immediate impact.
Stanford recruited Ryan as a point guard, his preferred position, while others saw him as more of a combo guard or even putting him off the ball. The Cardinal has put together a top-10 recruiting class in 2018, a group Ryan believes he can develop with. The only thing missing from it was a point guard.
“They have designs for me to play the one,” he said.
Ryan grew up in downtown Manhattan playing multiple sports. At 13, he dropped soccer and turned all of his attention to basketball. The plan truly went into motion when he left Collegiate, an elite Manhattan prep school, and later when he switched AAU programs, going from The City to the Middlesex Magic. Now, thanks at least in part to those difficult decisions, he’s ready to live out his dream.
“It has paid off,” he said. “I couldn’t have predicted it would have gone this way, but I’m sure happy it did.
“It’s awesome. If I told my 10-year-old self this is where I would be right now, he would probably throw up his hands in the air and be really excited.”
Ryan averaged 19.0 points, 6.5 rebounds, and 5.0 assists as a junior for Milton Academy while shooting 40 percent from 3-point land, helping them reach the ultra-competitive NEPSAC semifinals.
A strong defender, he led the team in blocked shots and charges drawn. When asked if there was any games that stood out, Reddicks joked, “any game that’s a big game.” He always thrived against elite opponents.
“He just turns it up another notch,” Reddicks said. His basketball IQ , one college coach familiar with Ryan, stands out even more than his ability.
“He has a tremendous feel,” the college coach said. “He almost always makes the right play. He’s two or three steps ahead of most players.”
Obviously, he had similar intuition off the court, too. It’s helped him get all the way to Stanford.
Seton Hall picked up Sacred Heart transfer Quincy McKnight on Friday.
He has two seasons of eligibility remaining, but has to sit out next year as per NCAA transfer rules.
RECRUITING CONFIDENTIAL By Zach Braziller