Austin’s Ajuda Nywesh was all smiles Thursday as the Packers wrapped up their Class AAA semifinal win over Holy Family in the Minnesota State Boys Basketball Tournament at Target Center. Herald File Photo

Austin senior Ajuda Nywesh made his verbal commitment to play men’s basketball at Lake Region State College in Devils Lake, N.D. next season on Monday.

LRSC is a Division I NJCAA school and Nywesh will receive a full athletic scholarship to play at the two-year junior college.

Nywesh’s game grew by leaps and bounds over the past two seasons and he averaged 14.4 points, 2.6 assists and 2.8 rebounds per game for the Packers this past season. He drew a lot of interest from plenty of colleges and he’ll get a chance to play right away at LRSC, which went 19-12 overall last season and averaged 91 points per game.

“It was very exciting getting calls from coaches and having teams that want you to go to their school,” Nywesh said. “At the end of the day when you have to choose which school you’re going to it’s hard because of all of the relationships you’ve built with all of those coaches.”

Nywesh was the sixth man for Austin two years ago, but this season saw him rise to the team’s go-to scorer down the stretch. He hit a game-winning 3-pointer to knock off Rochester John Marshall when the Packers won the Big Nine and he scored 24 points in a 60-40 loss to De La Salle in the Class AAA state title game.

Nywesh is now the fourth Packer to make a college basketball commitment in the past two years. Austin’s Tom Aase is at the University of Sioux Falls, Joe Aase is at Davidson College and Zach Wessels will got to Sioux Falls next season.

Nywesh said he expects his teammate Bret Lukes to make a commitment soon as well.

“I guess when they say hard work pays off it does,” Nywesh said. “Growing up, all of the sacrifices parents have made and we’ve made, it’s paid off.”

While it can get quite cold in the winter in North Dakota, Nywesh was quick to point out that LRSC has indoor tunnels that connect the whole school. Nywesh also knows a couple of his future teammates from playing AAU basketball and he’s looking forward to playing to college basketball next season.

“It’s going to be a new step in life,” Nywesh said. “It’s going to be exciting.”