Interesting.

I looked on his Wikipedia page, and the "recruiting process" section had some additional info. It sounds like he led his recruiting process, which seems odd for a highly talented player. The U.S. has a huge youth basketball eco-system with AAU Basketball. Most talent is identified at a young age, and the AAU system allows the best players to travel the country playing with other top talent. There are built-in college recruiting channels into this system. Also, good high school coaches should have strong ties with at least the local college coaches. It seems odd that he had to lead his recruiting efforts in California.

It doesn't sound like Lin had these support systems behind him. The PAC-10 schools (Cal, UCLA, Stanford) had enough interest in him to encourage him to walk-on, but not enough to offer a scholarship. He also sent out feelers to ALL the Ivy League schools, but only got offers to join basketball teams from two of them.

Division 1 NCAA scholarships are restricted to something like 70 per school across all sports. I'd be surprised if any 2nd tier high school players get div 1 athletic scholarships, even if they're good. The guys getting scholarships were scouted out in junior high school.

"Division 1 NCAA scholarships are restricted to something like 70 per school across all sports." That's not true. I've never heard of an NCAA total scholarship limit, only limits based on specific sports. Even if there were a limit, it would be way more than 70 (college football alone is allowed 85). Also, basketball would get first priority on being fully funded because it's a high revenue sport. Here is a list of the scholarship limits by sport, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Division_I_(NCAA)#Scholarship_l....

Are you saying he's a 2nd tier high school players because he played for a division 2 high school team? If you are, I don't think you understand much about high school basketball. California is some of the best in the country. As mentioned above, their division 2 state title win was over a nationally ranked team. Division 2 just means your high school is smaller, it's not the same as being an NCAA division 2 team.

"The guys getting scholarships were scouted out in junior high school." Although this happens (chris webber being the first example that comes to mind) it doesn't happen that often, and even if it does the player still has to prove things in high school because only verbal scholarships can be offered before a players junior year.

I'm just saying it's not surprising he didn't get a scholarship from a div 1 school. Athletic divisions may be enrollment based, but generally correspond to top levels of play. Smaller schools known to be a powerhouse in a sport can petition to play in the top division. Where I grew up in Minnesota, the hockey team with the most division AA championships is in a small town and only has about 350 students. Even Palo Alto high school plays Division 1 in baseball and women's volleyball. If it was known as a basketball powerhouse, Lin probably would have received more attention.

With your correction, there's still only 4500 Div 1 basketball scholarships available. Did anyone else in his division get such a scholarship?

In each state, there is at least one guy with his stats in the equivalent division who also doesn't get a scholarship. My cousin was 6 foot 5, averaged 30 points a game, led his team to state, was very athletic and won summer dunk contests, but played division 3, so still wasn't good enough to even play in college, in any division, much less get a scholarship. I went to college with Devean George and he was only there because didn't get scholarships anywhere, either.