Gorton standout Chris Ranglin informed me today that he’s accepting a full scholarship to play next season at Adelphi University.

Adelphi is a Division II school located in Garden City, Long Island. The basketball team plays in the East Coast Conference, where it went 20-9 last season and reached the conference semifinals. Two local kids, Chris Diasparra of Mahopac and Robert Johnson of Tuckahoe, are also on the roster.

Ranglin had a remarkable senior season at Gorton, averaging 22.3 points, 8 rebounds and 3-4 steals, blocks and assists per game. He’s a well-built 6-foot-2, 200-pounder who can play shooting guard, small forward and power forward.

A quiet kid, I could sense in Ranglin’s voice today how excited he was about this opportunity. Any time you get to go to college for free, it’s a beautiful thing. Gorton coach Rob Rizzo said he couldn’t remember the last athlete from the school to get a full scholarship in any sport.

Obviously, the Division I dream burned inside of Ranglin, and surely some would have come calling in the few months when their first choices went elsewhere. But he’s a mature kid and his reason for choose Adelphi was the best anybody can have:

“They were recruiting me really hard and were after me for a long time,” he said.

Like I always say, go to a school that wants you, not one that will accept you.

Rizzo did nothing but praise Ranglin, not because of the decision he made, but the lasting impact he left on the program.

“Chris is the one, more than me, who is responsible for turning this program around,” said Rizzo, who was recently honored as Section 1’s coach of the year. “I can only say so much. But if the players didn’t buy into what I was saying, it wouldn’t have worked. For someone like Chris, who’s from the old regime, to buy in was most important. He’s the best player, the oldest one and one they all look up to. If he didn’t buy into it, I would have been banging my head against the wall all year.”

Ranglin approached Rizzo last April when he took the job at Gorton to ask about playing AAU. Three years earlier, Rizzo tried to convince Ranglin to play with the Westchester Hawks but he showed no interest.

“He was content with being the big fish in the little pond,” Rizzo said.

By this point last year, almost every good AAU program was filled, especially at the 17-and-under levels, which are comprised of kids who’ve been playing together for three years. Rizzo, though, convinced Ranglin he could be a college player either way.

“I told him that, either way, you’ve got to work on your game,” Rizzo said. “If you do everything you’re supposed to do on your end, you’ll go to college for free.”

Rizzo said Ranglin never missed a day of practice or workout since that conversation. He used to pick Ranglin up at his house at 6:20 a.m. every morning so they could shoot for a half hour before the school. Even when he missed six weeks with a dislocated his toe during the summer, he was still there.

“He’d sit there in a chair and dribble the basketball,” Rizzo said. “He would sit there and take in everything we did.

“Chris was a great player, but I’m going to miss his leadership so more than anything else. I didn’t have to be the bad guy most of the time. Once I established a tone of what I expected, he took the ball and ran with it. He craved discipline, he craved structure and he wanted to be worked.”

It makes you feel good when you hear a story like Ranglin’s. He’s a self-made player and a trailblazer for the program. Any success he finds in college, he completely deserves.