Books before basketball for DV’s Kyle Pitman

On the surface, Kyle Pitman is your typical high school student-athlete.

Dig a little deeper and you’ll realize he isn’t exactly like his teammates on Phoenix Desert Vista’s varsity basketball team.

Pitman, the son of Phoenix Suns Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer Jim Pitman, not only excels on the Thunder hoops squad, but in the classroo as well. How many high school athletes can sport a 4.7 GPA (on a 4.0 scale) and a perfect 800 score on the math portion of their SAT?

Realizing basketball will only take him so far, the 6’3″ combo guard is looking to take his game and more importantly education, to another level. He will likely choose between MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Vassar College (New York), Grinnell (Iowa), and Grand Canyon University. He has applied to all three schools and will likely make his final decision in March.

“I’m leaning towards the D-III schools because they’re very good academic institutions,” Pitman said following his 11-point, five rebound, three steal performance in the Thunder’s overtime with over Mesa Red Mountain Thursday in the VisitMesa.com Tournament.

Pitman is so far advanced scholastically at DV he’d qualify as a second semester sophomore or first semester junior next fall if he opted to attend one of the three Arizona state universities. He’ll have 60 college credits when he graduates this summer.

His dad has given him some helpful hints as he sifts through the selection process.

“One, make sure you like the school you’re going to,” Jim Pitman told Pros2Preps.com. “You better enjoy the campus and the people. Two, the coaching staff on the basketball team. You can’t be changing schools. You make the commitment, you have to go where you’re going.”

On the floor he’s expanded his game the past four years, specifically in his athletic ability. Playing on the Thunder volleyball team has increased his vertical jump to 30 inches and with a two to three-step run it’s around 37 inches.

Pitman’s also grown into a leadership role on and off the floor.

“He’s a coach on the court and on the bench,” Desert Vista head coach Dave Williams said chuckling. “He’s probably one of two kids in my life that tells me what to do. He says coach let’s run this, run that. He is a quarterback on the team.”