Penn football coach Al Bagnoli probably doesn’t remember Chris Crockett.
And why should he?
A sophomore guard on the Columbia basketball team averaging a modest two points per game could hardly be on the coach’s radar.
But before taking the court for the Lions, Crockett was a hot commodity as a high-school football player, and a slew of Ivy schools were after him.
Two years ago, Crockett sat in the office of Harvard football coach Tim Murphy and was told the Crimson wanted to build their program around him.
Murphy wasn’t the only one recruiting the 5-foot-10 running back. Crockett drew interest from Notre Dame and Boston College, receiving offers from programs like Iowa and Ohio State.
“All the big schools were interested in him,” said Mark Barren, Crockett’s high-school football coach. “I think he probably would have had more if basketball wasn’t in the equation.”
His former star agrees.
“I really do think my love for basketball overpowered it,” Crockett said. “[Murphy] actually asked me if I was done with basketball, and I couldn’t say no. That’s really hard to do when you’re sitting there talking to a head football coach, but I couldn’t lie.”
Crockett was a high school basketball standout at Columbus Academy in Columbus, Ohio, where he started at point guard for nearly four years.
He was twice named team captain, racked up two team MVP awards and was named League and District Player of the Year, averaging 23.6 points and 7.5 assists per game during a first team all-state junior season.
But when it came to playing at the next level, Crockett’s problem was that he played just as well — if not better — on the football field, notching 1,682 yards his junior year and leading Ohio running backs with 33 touchdowns.
According to Barren, Crockett was one of the three most desirable backs in central Ohio by the end of his senior year.
Even with his notable football success, Crockett still had basketball programs like Miami of Ohio and Xavier knocking at his door.
Then things changed under the Friday night lights.
“I tried to make a cut that I had made a thousand times before,” Crockett said. “I was going right and tried to cut back across the field and the knee just gave out.”
Crockett tore his medial patellofemoral ligament and dislocated his kneecap. The prognosis: no more football season, no basketball season.
“A lot of offers and opportunities were off the table,” he said. “A lot of them backed out … and I was just kind of stuck because a lot of basketball programs I wanted didn’t come around.”
Crockett watched the rest of the football season on crutches, rehabilitating his knee for months before making it back in time for the final eight games of his senior basketball season.
“Nothing was going to keep me from playing once they told me it was fixable,” Crockett said. “We had high expectations to play for our senior year at Columbus Academy … I loved the team, I loved every minute of that.”
With a different landscape of athletic opportunities, Crockett took Barren’s advice and followed his heart to the Lions.
“[Columbia] kind of put a bug in my ear before the injury and then afterwards, they stuck around and kept in contact,” said Crockett, who credits the Lions’ former assistant, Jim Engles, with reeling him in.
Crockett now plays behind upperclassmen and has been working for more playing time. It’s a contrast to the high school years he spent as the key player on two teams.
“Sitting on the bench — it humbles you,” Crockett said. “It doesn’t mean slack off because you’re not playing, it means work harder to get on the court.”
The sophomore believes everything that led him to Columbia happened for a reason. Studying economics and psychology, he hopes to stay in the realm of athletics and work in sports marketing or sports management after graduate school.
Not surprisingly, Crockett is a loyal fan of the Lions football team, taking in most games and sometimes joking with the coaches who once recruited him.
“He made the right decision because he loves basketball,” Barren said. “But what a lot of people might not realize is that running around on the basketball court as a guard for Columbia is potentially the best running back in the Ivy League.”
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