Former El Camino hoops star Michael Smith looking beyond historic college career

As a senior in 2016-17, Smith earned his second consecutive PacWest Conference Player of the Year honor. He also surpassed the 2,000-point career for his career, setting the all-time Cal Baptist career scoring record as well as the PacWest career mark.

Now, the prolific Division II swing guard is looking for work.

“I’m ready to go,” Smith said. “I’m ready to compete and try to get a contract.”

While Smith is currently busy playing his first season in the San Francisco Bay Area Pro-am Summer Basketball League with the San Francisco Bay Raiders, he’s got a promising workout on the horizon at the Worldwide Invitational. The annual showcase is essentially a scouting combine for international pro leagues. It will be held July 9-11 at UNLV.

Coming off a big-league primer, Smith is brimming with confidence. He was invited to the Los Angeles Lakers pre-draft workout June 15, where he competed alongside No. 1 overall draft pick of the Philadelphia 76ers, Markelle Fultz, with a star-studded audience that included Lakers head coach Luke Walton and president of basketball operations Magic Johnson. 

Smith said he was hoping to catch on with a team in the NBA Summer League, but had no suitors. So, now, he is looking for his first taste of pro ball on the international market. He already has an offer on the table from a team in Mexico’s pro league, the Liga Nacional de Baloncesto Profesional. But he is waiting to make a decision on signing a pro contract until September when he can weigh any and all offers.

“We’re obviously going to look into that, but it’s a little early to sign something like that right now,” Smith said.

With the trajectory of Smith’s basketball career, being in international limbo may be the ideal place for the 6-4 guard. Since his early days at El Camino, where he didn’t crack the varsity roster until his junior season, Smith has long excelled from playing with a chip on his shoulder.

“I’ve always had a lot of confidence in myself, even when other people didn’t have confidence in the way I played the game,” Smith said. “I just always held myself accountable to get a little better every year, and work on the things I had to work on.”

When Cal Baptist head coach Rick Croy first scouted Smith, he identified the guard’s competitive drive. At that time, Croy was still a Division I assistant coach at Saint Mary’s. When Croy took over as head coach at Cal Baptist, though, he brought in Smith as a foundation player.

“We knew early on, from the very first workout, that we had a tenacious competitor,” Croy said. “But I don’t think anyone would have predicted the incredible career he had.”

Oh what a career it was. But, no, no one did predict it. Had anyone done so, Smith surely would have gotten more scholarship offers than he did. As it worked out, Cal Baptist was the only school to offer him a full ride. The financial incentive made for an easy choice.

“I for sure wanted to make sure myself and my mom wouldn’t have to pay tuition loans,” Smith said. “That was the first thing I worried about.”

While Smith immediately cracked the Lancers’ starting five as a freshman — he started all but one game in 2013-14 — he was considered more of a defensive standout as a freshman and sophomore. It wasn’t until his junior season that he flourished as an all-around scoring threat.

“He’s just a guy that kept getting better every year,” Croy said.

After averaging 11.3 points per game as a sophomore in 2014-15, he emerged as the best scorer in the conference as a junior, leading the PacWest with a 21.4 point scoring average. He improved on that mark as a senior, averaging 24.9 points per game. And on Jan. 14, he entered the record books as the program’s career scoring leader.

“After the game, everybody was staying in their seats and stuff like that,” Smith said. “It was a pretty big moment. … They presented me the game ball and said how many points I had. That was a pretty cool moment.”

Croy said he has no doubt Smith would have made a quality Division I player. That he went the Division II route, though, seems to only frame Smith’s legacy more appropriately.

“I feel like I left a legacy that you don’t have to be the guy who’s highly recruited or even be a guy who was very good when he starts in college, or even high school,” Smith said.

“I think Mike would have been a great player no matter where he went,” Croy said. “He’s just a guy who’s very difficult to outwork.”