North Carolina State University Athletics
PEELER: Smith Hungry to Lead Pack
11/18/2010 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Nov. 18, 2010
Wolfpack Heads to Charleston Classic
Editor's note: This story originally appeared in the 2010-11 Wolfpacker Basketball edition. It is reprinted here with permission from Coman Publishing. Copyright 2010.
BY TIM PEELER
RALEIGH, N.C. - Tracy Smith had to protect his food tray.
As a junior at Mount Zion Christian Academy in Durham, Smith was trying to do the right thing by cutting down on his intake of unhealthy foods. He vowed to stay away from the fried, greasy food he had become addicted to after arriving from Detroit, a 15-year-old kid on his own for the first time who went looking for comfort in a gravy biscuit.
"I ate pretty much whatever I wanted," Smith said.
But, following his sophomore year, the sprouting basketball forward made a pact with Mount Zion assistant coach Stephén Newton to lose the bulk of the weight he put on his first year in the South.
Newton took the weight-loss pact seriously, after watching Smith's weight balloon more than 60 pounds from the day he first arrived from Detroit to the end of his sophomore year at the private Christian school. The coach would sneak up on Smith in the cafeteria, just to see what was on his plate.
"If I was eating the wrong thing, he would snatch my food away from me," Smith says, smiling.
Smith had fallen in love with fried chicken and other richly prepared Southern delicacies. In less than a year, he gained more than 65 pounds on his once-lean frame. He found it difficult to get up and down the court, even though he was dominating inside. The college recruiters who had been so interested in him before began to disappear, like an unguarded cookie in Smith's pantry.
"After being ranked in the Top 20 players in the country after my sophomore year, I went on-line one day to see where I was ranked," Smith said. "My name wasn't anywhere. Not in the Top 100 or the Top 250. I couldn't believe it.
"My high school coach came up to me and said `You know why everybody has forgotten about you? All that weight you've been putting on.' I decided I need to lose it."
He began eating his chicken baked and grilled, not fried. He cut out the sugary soft drinks and sweet snacks. It didn't take long before he began shedding the extra pounds, thanks to an improved diet, a workout regimen and constant playing throughout the summer.
He eventually worked his way back into the rivals.com top 50 players in the nation by his senior year at Mount Zion.
He continued to drop weight after he arrived at NC State, converting baby fat into muscle. He lost nearly 12 pounds between his freshman and sophomore seasons, as he slowly became one of the Wolfpack's top offensive and rebounding threats.
Now, as he enters his senior season for the Wolfpack, Smith appreciates Newton's unique approach to weight loss. Smith is a muscular 243 pounds, with just eight percent body fat. That's a far cry from his sophomore year in high school, when he weighed almost 285 pounds and had a whopping 16 percent body fat.
He is ready to run up and down the floor in the up-tempo style than fifth-year coach Sidney Lowe has promised to use, with the influx of talented freshmen C.J. Leslie, Lorenzo Brown and Ryan Harrow. They have helped inspire Smith and other returning veterans to become leaner and faster on the court.
Sophomore Richard Howell, who was a little rounder than expected last season after suffering a preseason knee injury that limited his workouts, is noticeably smaller, while centers DeShawn Painter and Jordan Vandenberg are much bulkier than they were as freshmen.
Smith has matured greatly since his freshman season, when he showed some flashes of his ability down the stretch but played in just 20 games. He became a bigger contributor as a sophomore, but was overshadowed by upperclassmen Ben McCauley, Brandon Costner and Courtney Fells in their final season with the Pack.
Last season, matured into one of the ACC's top inside threats and the Wolfpack's primary offensive option. He was the Wolfpack's leading scorer (16.5 points per game) and rebounder (7.3 rebounds per game), ranking in the top 10 in both categories in the league statistics. His shooting percentage of 52.4 was the highest in the ACC.
On his 22nd birthday, he was spectacular in the Wolfpack's win over eventual national champion Duke, making 10 of his 12 shots for 23 points and establishing his career high against an ACC opponent.
He finished strong, helping the Wolfpack reach the ACC Tournament semifinals before falling to Georgia Tech. By the end of April, Smith thought about leaving school a year early by putting his name in the NBA Draft.
But he quickly withdrew it, without visiting or working out for any teams. He did it primarily as a fact-finding mission to discover how much NBA teams knew about his game and what he needed to do to improve his game for the next level.
"I didn't work out for anybody because I was too busy with school and too busy working out here during that time," Smith said. "Basically, I just wanted to get my name out there, and see what they thought of me and my game.
"Now I have a better idea of what they're looking for in my game."
Smith, who has been in the starting lineup for 45 of the Pack's last 46 games, knows he has a few things to prove to the NBA scouts, who project him to be a power forward, during his final collegiate season. For the last three years, the 6-8 Smith has played out of position as an undersized pivot. This year, head coach Sidney Lowe is fulfilling his promise to move Smith to the power forward, handing the center position over to sophomores Painter and Vandenberg.
Smith is ready to face the basket more, take a few more 15-foot jumps shots and move more quickly up and down the court.
"I think we're going to do a lot of running," Smith said. "Now, I think I'm more athletic. My running, my stamina and my wind have all improved."
Smith rededicated himself to improving his body this summer, modeling his workout regimen after the two hardest working teammates he ever played with, J.J. Hickson and Courtney Fells. Hickson, now with the Cleveland Cavaliers, was a workout fiend, arriving at the gym by 5:45 a.m. most days to get in an individual workout before class.
Smith joined Hickson for those crack-of-dawn workouts on occasion. So when Lowe decided to switch the team's practices from afternoons to early mornings, Smith made the adjustment quickly.
He also admired just how hard Fells, who now plays professionally in Europe, prepared himself for the season.
"Those two guys are the people I looked up to most since I was here," Smith said. "I try to have a similar work ethic."
Smith himself is not a particularly vocal leader on the court or in the lockerroom. In fact, the way he leads by example is to remain even keeled on the court, even when things aren't going his way. That's a personality trait he tries to instill in his younger teammates.
"Tracy's been good about teaching me how to stick with things," said Howell, who will both split time with Smith at power forward and share some time on the court with him under the basketball. "There've been times when I miss a basket or make a turnover and put my head down.
"Tracy's always there to pick me up and help me move on. He's basically showed me that it is okay to mess up, instead of trying to be perfect every minute of the game. You just have to go on to the next play."
Smith's temperament might seem calm, but he is passionate about having an outstanding senior season. He won't take a backseat to the trio of talented freshmen who have brought so much excitement into the program, Harrow as a playmaking guard and Brown and Leslie as versatile players on the wing and frontcourt.
"I don't think Tracy really worries about that," Lowe said. "He knows when it comes down to it, when we need a shot or a big basket, his teammates are coming down to him. I think he looks forward to playing with these guys. He might just get a few more easy baskets out of it.
"He's still our No. 1 option when we don't have a shot on the fastbreak."
In fact, Smith completely embraces the arrival of his new teammates, because he believes they can help him and their teammates reach great heights.
"I'm not even thinking about how much I'll be getting the ball this year," Smith said. "I just want us to win. We haven't been to the NCAA Tournament since I've been here and that is one of my biggest goals. I want to win an ACC championship, go to the NCAA Tournament and go to the Final Four, win a championship.
"I think this team can go very far, because everybody fights hard and competes. Everybody on the team wants to get there."
So there you have it. Smith, who has come so far since those less-than-lean high school days, is hungry once again and he's not about to let someone sneak up and snatch this dream out of his hands.
You may contact Tim Peeler at tim_peeler@ncsu.edu.
