Full Scholarship

After finishing the away game against the University of Pittsburgh, the team returned to Connecticut.

At the end of the day's training session, Cahoon called Tang Tian to his office alone.

"Tang, you might not know how difficult it is for non-scholarship players in the NCAA to get a full scholarship. Let me tell you a story," Cahoon said, gesturing for him to sit down before starting his story.

Tang Tian listened patiently. Cahoon wouldn't have called him just to tell a story.

"There was a student named Jerome who joined a Division I NCAA team. He trained very hard for four years but never received a full scholarship. The team gave him 30 seconds of playing time in the final game as a reward. His story later became an inspirational tale widely circulated in the NCAA, but this is also an unwritten rule of the NCAA: players without scholarships basically don't get playing time."

Tang Tian nodded after listening. Cahoon was using this story to hint at him, to show him how special he was.

"Of course, you are not an ordinary player. You've proven your strength, so I've been trying my best, and yesterday the school finally gave me a reply. They agreed. You will be the ninth recipient of a full scholarship on the team."

After a bit of preamble, Cahoon finally delivered the news to Tang Tian.

"Thank you, Coach. I will play hard and not let your recognition go to waste," Tang Tian said calmly, smiling as he stood up.

Cahoon, being an old-school coach, liked to go through the motions. This was simply his way of ensuring Tang Tian wouldn't forget him as a mentor if he became successful in the future.

It was human nature, and Tang Tian didn't think too much of it. He had already achieved his goal by getting a full scholarship.

"Good, very good," Cahoon said, smiling broadly.

"Oh, right. I also applied for a nutrition package for you from the school," Cahoon said, suddenly remembering.

A nutrition package?

Tang Tian looked a bit confused.

"I know you've been working on your physical conditioning, and your methods are good. But besides the methods, nutrition also needs to keep up for better results," Cahoon continued.

"Thank you, Coach." This time, Tang Tian's gratitude was genuine.

Cahoon had his old-school ways, but just like the coaches he knew before, he was fundamentally a good coach.

Cahoon had only just told Tang Tian the news when someone from the school came to communicate with him about collecting his scholarship elsewhere.

As a renowned institution in Connecticut, UConn invested heavily in scholarships. For full athletic scholarships, the annual amount was $50,000, which many other universities couldn't match.

Of course, this was only relative to other institutions in Connecticut. Nationwide, there were many schools that offered more than UConn. Schools like Duke and Kentucky likely offered twice as much.

However, $50,000 was more than enough for Tang Tian.

Back in his dorm, his roommates were all in class. He pulled up the system interface.

He glanced at his cash-in value.

$50,600.

The $50,000 was from the full scholarship he had just received, and the $600 was his salary as a ball boy.

Since he was now a member of the team and had received a scholarship, the $600 was his last payment as a ball boy.

But the trailing digits weren't important; the main sum was.

$50,000 in cash shop points was enough for him to make a purchase in the mall and directly get a white-tier skill.

Compared to other tiers, white-tier skills were the least powerful, but he had already made his decision the first time he saw the system.

Among these white-tier skills, things like King of Jumps (LeBron White) were the most useless. Forget about the NCAA; they probably wouldn't even be effective in lower-tier leagues, only useful for exhibition games. As for Diver (Varejao) and King of Free Throws (Calderon), they weren't needed for now.

He already had a target in mind.

Open Three-Pointer (Novak): This skill belonged to three-point sharpshooter Novak. It allowed the user to achieve a 97% three-point shooting percentage when open, but the percentage would plummet to below 30% under defensive pressure. Furthermore, as stamina decreased, the open three-point percentage would also decay from 97%, dropping to 50%.

This was a peculiar skill, perfectly matching Novak's abilities.

In Novak's most accurate season, his three-point shooting percentage reached 75%. Even throughout his entire career, his three-point percentage exceeded 43%!

This was a terrifying statistic. Many top three-point shooters never had a single season exceeding this number.

In NBA-level games, exceeding 40% made you an absolute sharpshooter.

Yet, such a shooter bounced around the NBA for almost his entire career because he couldn't do anything besides shoot. He had no defense, no ability to handle pressure, and no passing skills. Without tactical plays from his teammates to create opportunities, he didn't even have the ability to create his own shot.

To put it bluntly, he was a shooting machine, and only a spot-up shooter at that.

But for Tang Tian, this was enough.

What he currently possessed was exactly what Novak lacked the most: defense.

With defense, combined with this almost unerring open-shot ability, he could establish himself in the NCAA.

Although UConn had recently achieved a three-game winning streak, Tang Tian was slowly starting to be targeted by opponents. He often found himself left open during games.

This was perfectly normal. Initially, opponents wouldn't know his capabilities and wouldn't dare to leave him open. But as his playing time increased and his reputation grew, opponents would naturally study him and devise strategies against him.

For example, looking at his post-game stats, he might have steals and rebounds, but his score would consistently be 0. That was definitely abnormal!

Abnormal situations would lead to experimentation. If they tried leaving him open and found that he indeed couldn't shoot, or that his shots rarely went in, then leaving him open would become a common tactic.

Therefore, acquiring this Open Three-Pointer would be the most effective move.

Moreover, there was a crucial point for Tang Tian: unlike the NBA, players in the NCAA were not allowed to earn money through endorsements or advertisements. In the NCAA, players were prohibited from making money in any form, even if it was given privately by the school. Violating this rule would most likely result in immediate expulsion from the league.

This was something the NCAA had long been criticized for, especially considering that the league earned more money during March Madness than the NBA playoffs!

But these were the rules, and they were beyond an individual's control.

So this 50,000 gold could be the biggest chunk he gets. In that case, he should definitely choose this Open Three-Pointer.

With this Open Three-Pointer and then improving his physique, he'd be a solid 3D player.

With the way basketball is developing faster and faster in the future, this would be quite sought after, even considered rare.

And he's only 18 years old now. His body will likely grow a bit more under normal circumstances. Then, a stretch four or a 3D wing swingman would be completely possible for him.

This round of spending gold is definitely a guaranteed profit with no losses.