Four-Star Point Guard Commits to Harvard

High school point guard Bryce Aiken, the No. 78 recruit in the Class of 2016, announced his commitment to Harvard Thursday afternoon on Twitter. Aiken is the second member of the Scout.com's Top 100 to commit to Harvard, a first for the Crimson.

"We have a high caliber recruiting class and talented kids,” Aiken told Scout.com. “We all went on the visit together so it was nice to get to know them. I’m looking forward to get up there with those players and helping make history.”

The talented point guard is the first four-star recruit Harvard has had at the position under coach Tommy Amaker. He is, along with freshman Tommy McCarthy, one of the long-term candidates to take over the position from senior Siyani Chambers, who is taking a year of leave to rehab his ACL injury.

Both represent a change in recruiting strategy for the team, which has loaded up on highly touted forwards and centers in years past. Since Amaker arrived, the team has recruited 13 players who earned a three or four-star rating from ESPN: just two were classified as guards. The strategy has had measurable effects on the court: over the last three years, just two players—Chambers and Wesley Saunders ’15—have played nearly all the backcourt minutes for the team.

Aiken, whom an ESPN high school scouting report called “a complete point guard”, noted that the team pursued him relentlessly.

"[All the coaches] were on me through the entire way," Aiken told NJ.com. "And Coach Amaker just did a tremendous job of explaining how he would use me in his system, and how he believed in me and trusted me to be the next great one from Harvard.”

Aiken is Harvard’s sixth verbal commit in the Class of 2016, joining fellow top-100 recruit Chris Lewis, four-star recruit Robert Baker Jr., and four other three-stars. The class is Harvard’s largest since the class of 2011, which included three-year starters Steve Moundou-Missi ’15 and Wesley Saunders ’15 and five rotation players overall.

—Check TheCrimson.com and follow @THCSports on Twitter for updates.

—Staff writer David Freed can be reached at david.freed@thecrimson.com. Follow him on Twitter @CrimsonDPFreed.