When sophomore center Kenyatta Smith walked off the court in Salt Lake City for the final time this season, he did so with his head held high.

In a game where Harvard basketball’s top scoring duo was held to a combined 14 points and the Crimson’s offense seemed powerless, Smith stepped up.

The Crimson’s season came to a close with a 23-point loss to Arizona in the third round of the NCAA tournament, but Smith wrapped up his season with a team-high 10 points and three steals.

“We knew we needed something, and he delivered,” Harvard coach Tommy Amaker said. “He delivered more than anyone could have imagined.”

Smith—a three-star recruit who was the No. 13 center in his class according to scout.com—was coming off a disappointing freshman year in which he saw limited playing time and put up three points in eight games. At the start of the 2013 season, Smith was tapped to start in the first five games. He averaged 5.4 points per game and found himself on the bench for the next 16 games in favor of classmates Steve Moundou-Missi and Jonah Travis.

But everything changed in February.

Coming off a road loss to Columbia that knocked Harvard out of sole ownership of first place in the Ivy League, Amaker decided to shake up his starting lineup going into the make-or-break home weekend against Penn and Princeton at Lavietes Pavilion.