GREAT FALLS — Lewistown’s Royce Robinson committed to play for the Montana State men’s basketball team on Wednesday, less than a week after re-opening his recruitment following the surprise resignation of head coach Kurt Paulson at Carroll College, where he’d originally signed.
“Paulson kind of threw everybody for a loop with his resignation,” Robinson said. “Nobody really saw it coming and it really confused me on what I was going to do, what my future was going to look like.”
Robinson, who averaged 24.2 pig and 7.4 rebounds to help the Eagles to a 24-0 record and a State A title, had originally planned wait and see who Carroll selected as their head coach. He was a Saint through and through, committed and signed, along with three of his Eagles teammates who are joining the Saints football team.
But when he re-opened his recruitment, he received unexpected interest from the new kid on the block. Montana State’s new head coach Matt Logie. Robinson left Great Falls, where he was practicing with the East team ahead of Saturday’s Shrine game, and went for a visit with the Bobcats in Bozeman on Tuesday.
“I had a great, great visit and they showed a lot of class and gave me some interest that I couldn’t pass up on,” Robinson said. “Coach Logie has been really great. He’s been really busy, but he still took the time to reach out to me and get me down there for a visit and I appreciate that. So I was really pleased with everything they did for me, and that’s a big part of the reason I’m going there.”
Though Robinson is now a Bobcat, he’ll always keep tabs on Carroll. Three of his teammates on Lewistown’s undefeated and record setting football and basketball teams - Gage Norslien, Jett Boyce and Matthew Golik - are headed to Helena to play football for Troy Purcell and the Carroll Saints.
“That was the hardest part about this decision was leaving those guys,” Robinson said. “But we’ll still be pretty close and always cheering each other on.”
