Columbia and Michigan degrees together will open a lot of doors in the business world, and former U-M guard Mike Smith has found that out. He has a few corporate offers, he noted, but he’s not ready to hang up the basketball shoes just yet.
Smith struggled a bit in his first game at the NBA Elite Combine last week, making one triple and dishing out a few assists, but he rebounded for a great performance on Day Two. He was one of the top five players that day per a G-League release after going 5-for-7 from the floor, 3-for-3 from long range and dishing out four assists in his team’s 97-73 win.
Smith finished plus-18 and scored 14 points in victory and helped boost his stock. NBA teams told him they wanted him to be a better leader on the floor and play better defense, and he took it to heart.
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“I’ve always been the underdog,” he said. “I spoke about it all year at Michigan … that I’ve been the underdog. I had to play harder than everybody else. I just had to go out here and leave my mark. At Michigan, people tried to post me up, but I think I got scored on four times in the post. Every other time I walled up and chested people, did what I had to do to show I could guard in the post if I had to switch against teams …
“Obviously, out here, I don’t have anything to lose. I always want to play like that. At the end of the day, a lot of people didn’t think I was going to be here, but at the end of the day, I’m here. I’m just going to go out and play my best, play hard, live with the results and have fun at the same time I’m trying to make connections.”
If a G-League team really wants him, he said, he’ll give that a shot. If not, he plans to go to Europe to make “a lot of money,” maybe come back and start a business.
But he’s sure of one thing — he’s not ready to retire just yet. He considered coming back to Michigan for a year, but he and his family thought it best to move on.
“It’s been a dream of mine forever, and I think playing on that platform definitely helped me get to where I’m sitting at right now and where I’m going to be in the next couple months,” he said. “A couple 9-5 offers, but I’m not ready to hang it up yet. It’s the Columbia and Michigan together … it’s a one-of-a-kind connection I’m blessed to have
“But I had a really good shooting year and shot the ball really well … 42 percent from three, so a step back is not that bad. Really, you’re shooting NBA threes in college, anyway. And I led the Big Ten in assists. I can find people when they’re open.”
All are parts of his game that will give him a chance to be a pro . But no matter what he does at the next level, he’ll never be forgotten for his part on a Big Ten championship team.
“It was special,” he said. Obviously, we came up short. We wanted to win it all, but at the end of the day we won the Big Ten regular season. We get to say that, come back to campus and get a banner for that, see that banner in the rafters, get a ring for that … we were top five most of season and played really well. Coach [Juwan] Howard did a great job.”
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