‘Dream come true.’ St. Patrick basketball star commits to PAC-12 school on the West Coast.
St. Patrick star guard and one of the Coast’s top high school basketball players has decided where he’s heading after high school.
Nick Krass officially announced his commitment to Oregon State on Tuesday.
“It feels like a dream come true, and when I sign it’ll be a dream come true,” Krass told the Sun Herald. “I’m excited to get to work up there.”
Krass played in front of three different Oregon State coaches three times this season and was impressed the school was interested enough to make the trip to South Mississippi for him on multiple occassions.
He and his family made the return trip recently on Krass’ official visit to Corvallis, where he met another Beaver commit. It was enough to leave Krass ready to make his commitment.
“Me, my family, my mom and my dad went up there last week on my official visit,” Krass said. “I got to meet another commit, Jayden (Stevens) from Spokane, Washington. They did it on purpose so we could meet each other. He was really cool, everybody was really cool, the team was cool. It was an awesome place. I just feel like I could really thrive in that situation up there.”
Oregon State is led by head coach Wayne Tinkle, who just wrapped up his eighth season at the helm. Krass will be the first Mississippi prospect Tinkle has ever recruited as a head coach.
The Beavers made a notable run to the Elite Eight in 2021 as PAC-12 champions before falling to 3-28 this past season.
Krass hopes to step in as a combo guard and carve out a role as a three-and-D player in his freshman season while working by the team motto “You earn what you get and you get what you earn.”
Krass averaged 22 points per game this season as one of the top scorers on the Coast and the led the team in nearly every stat category.
St. Patrick won’t be restarting with its Krass cupboard bare. Nick’s younger brother Mathew, a sharpshooting point guard, will be a junior next year.
The Fighting Irish won 31 games this season and made an appearance in the 3A Final Four in Jackson.
This story was originally published March 25, 2022 at 11:35 AM.
