MEDFORD, N.J.—Note to Patrick Harvey, Harvard’s one-man scoring machine this season: help is on the way.

After producing just one player in the past two years who has averaged ten minutes per game, the Harvard men’s basketball program has officially landed its most highly-touted recruit since Dan Clemente ’01.

Zach Martin, a 6’5 swingman from Shawnee High School in Medford, N.J., has committed to attend Harvard next fall. He comes with an impressive resume—after averaging nearly 20 points per game to lead Shawnee to a 28-3 record and a state championship last spring, Martin was ranked among the top 100 rising seniors in the country on CNNSI’s website.

A prolific scorer, Martin could bring immediate help to a Crimson offense that relied heavily on Harvey this season. The junior guard has been Harvard’s leading scorer in all but two games.

“We’ve tried to find some scoring,” Harvard Coach Frank Sullivan said of his staff’s recruiting goals this year. “I think all the guys we’ve tossed around fit that bill.”

According to several college recruiting web sites, New Mexico State, Wyoming and Princeton had all expressed interest in Martin earlier this year. Martin, though, said his final choice came down to Lafayette, Cornell and Harvard.

He made his official visit to Cambridge last fall, staying with Harvard junior Brady Merchant.

“I liked Boston a lot,” Martin said. “And I really like the coaches.”

Martin comes from a powerhouse program that has won four states titles in the last decade. Shawnee is the same school that produced Malik Allen of the NBA’s Miami Heat and the Earl brothers, Dan and Brian. Dan Earl was a star point guard for Penn State in the mid-1990s, while Brian started for the 1998 Princeton squad that finished the year ranked in the national top ten.

Despite missing part of his sophomore season with a broken foot, Martin entered this season with 1,246 career points, trailing only the Earl brothers and Allen on Shawnee’s all-time scoring list. Last year, he broke the elder Earl’s school record for points in a game when he exploded for 45.

According to Shawnee High School coach Joe Kessler, Martin was as explosive as any player he’d seen his freshman year. But he says Martin lost some of his quickness when he came back from his broken foot.

“He lost a step after that,” Kessler said. “If he hadn’t broke his leg, he’d probably be receiving offers from some mid-major Division I schools.”

After averaging nearly 18.6 points per game as a junior, Martin’s average is down to around 14 ppg this season. But Kessler says that drop has occured only because a number of other players on Shawnee’s senior-laden team has stepped up, taking some of the pressure off of Martin.

“Zach fits into our system perfectly,” Kessler said. “He’s not the fastest player or the most athletic, but he’s very talented.”

At 210 pounds, Martin has good size—“he’s a banger,” Kessler says—and can rebound well. Following his injury, Martin made a point of bulking up to compensate for his loss of foot speed, Kessler said. That has made Martin into a dominating post player at Shawnee.