Basketball: Player credits sport for academic achievements

The high school basketball season in California begins this week with four months of nonstop action, and if anyone can offer testimony on how the sport can make a difference in a teenager's life, it's 6-foot-3 senior Rohan Rao of Santa Ana Foothill High School.

"Basketball helped me get a perfect score on the SAT," he said. "It taught me dedication to keep going."

Among the Class of 2015, there were 1.7 million students who took the SAT, and 504 scored a perfect 2400 for the math, reading and writing portions of the test.

It was December when Rao achieved perfection. He had scored 2330 the first time he took the test and wanted to take it again because his older brother, Shankar, a Georgetown University graduate, got 2350 and was using his higher score to tease his little brother.

"It was a personal challenge," Rao said.

Then one morning Rao was awakened in his bedroom by his father and brother, who happened to be home from college. They learned his SAT score online.

"He was part of the waking-up committee," Rao said of his brother. "He was excited for me but angry I had beaten him. It was a bittersweet moment for him."

The brothers' parents came to the United States from India. Rao wants to become an orthopedic surgeon. He has 4.8 grade-point average and has applied to Stanford. He was a junior varsity basketball player last season and is challenging for a starting spot on varsity this season.

"He's a pretty darn good player," Foothill coach Rusty Van Cleave said. "He's a post player with great footwork. He's had to wait his turn."

His teammates know who to turn to when preparing for the SAT.

"If they need any SAT help, I'm the one they go to," he said.

And Van Cleave can't wait until Rao becomes a doctor.

"I trust him big time," he said.

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