AMHERST – Matt Cross spent the last seven years of his life at a different school each year before arriving at UMass.

He chose to make some moves to face better competition, prepare himself for his future or seek greater opportunity. Circumstances forced others on Cross when his coaches were either fired or left for other jobs. Either way, he couldn’t stay.

“It’s been hard. I’ve always just been trying to find somewhere to get comfortable. You get better every year if you can find somewhere comfortable because you gain a coach’s trust, they gain your trust,” Cross said. “The biggest thing that was hard about it was social media. When you move around so much, you’re the bad dude. Something’s wrong with you.”

The last time Cross stayed at the same place for consecutive seasons, he was a freshman at St. Mary’s in Lynn. Cross won a basketball state title as an eighth grader as a major piece of the team and helped the Spartans football team reach Gillette Stadium for the Super Bowl. He led St. Mary’s back to the state final as a freshman.

His Division 1 dreams set him on a path away from home that wouldn’t lead back for a long time.

“I knew if I wanted to play with better players and have any schools looking at me at all, I’d have to go to a prep school,” Cross said. “Because at least where I live in Beverly, Mass., there’s no coaches of the level I want to play at coming out there.”

He and his family landed on Cushing Academy for his sophomore season. Brooklyn Nets guard David Duke Jr., who played collegiately at Providence, was his point guard in the NEPSAC Class AA program.

“This is a New England thing. Prep school is the way to go if you want to maximize your potential and have a chance at playing at the next level,” said Jim Cross, Matt’s dad and one of his closest confidants. “Everyone would say you’ve got to go to these prep schools because that’s where all the college coaches go.”

Once they went that route, the goal posts moved: why not aim as high as they could and move up a step? Former UMass assistant Tony Bergeron called about the AAA program he’d started at Woodstock Academy in Connecticut. That squad faced the best teams in New England and some of the best in the country on a nightly basis.

Matt Cross spent time with future UMass teammates Noah Fernandes and Dyondre Dominguez. Then Bergeron left to become Matt McCall’s assistant in Amherst and join many of his former players. The program practically crumbled around Cross.

“That program is an all postgrad team. Matt’s the only junior on the team. There’s no seniors, one junior and all postgrads,” Jim Cross said. “Once he left and all these guys left because they were done, Matt was the only guy there, literally. We had to think, ‘oh this is done, we’ve got to move on.’”

Brewster Academy coach Jason Smith called. Matt Cross went from playing against the perennial powerhouses to playing for them.

“Nobody turns down an opportunity to play for Brewster if you can,” Jim Cross said.

All of that movement meant time away from home for Matt Cross, a self-described homebody. The NEPSAC schools were still close enough that his parents went to every game and saw him often.

“If this is his dream, we’re going to let him follow it. And I’m gonna support him,” Jim Cross said. “It isn’t easy. Everybody’s path is different – if that’s his path and his trajectory, and a lot of times he’s having to leave not of his own accord. He’s been hit with the unfortunate bug. At the end of the day his path has been to continue up the food chain.”

Matt Cross blossomed into one of the nation’s best players. Both 247sports.com and ESPN rated him a four-star prospect and one of the nation’s 100 best players. He signed with Miami out of high school but played in just 14 games for the Hurricanes after being dismissed from the program in Jan. 2021.

Cross landed back in the ACC at Louisville, playing more games but fewer minutes and had a smaller impact. Then Cardinals coach Chris Mack was fired in Jan. 2022, which put Cross back in the portal.

“He can’t catch a break with some of this stuff. We’re stuck with what do you do now?” Jim Cross said. “In college basketball the new regimes come in and want their own guys.”

Frank Martin called and invited the Crosses to come to campus and see what he was trying to build at UMass. He recruited Matt in high school, coming to the family’s living room to try and bring him to South Carolina.

“Frank is not for everybody, but he’s great for us. Frank is a very honest and loyal guy,” Jim Cross said. “That’s hard to find in this business. We gravitated toward that.”

Coming home was an easy pitch, too.

“After all the moving around I wanted to go back home, play in front of friends and family again and just have fun playing the sport again,” Matt Cross said. “It wasn’t fun. It became more of a business than anything. Being back at Massachusetts gives me that vibe again. I enjoy playing basketball.”

Miami and Louisville used him as a pure shooter and stuck him in the corner. Cross could hit 3s, but that wasn’t playing basketball to him. His shooting percentage dipped from the 40 percent clip he hit as a Hurricane to 35 percent in his first year as a Minuteman, but Cross led UMass in rebounding and was second in scoring. He had the most steals on the team.

“I’m shooting it, eh, right now. I used to be a really good shooter. Even though I was shooting it well, it was never what I loved to do,” Cross said. “I like to be part of the game, get physical. Go at it with someone a little bit. Rebound. Dive on the floor. That’s what makes me feel like I’m a part of the game.”

Cross’ physicality became UMass’ identity for long stretches of the season. The Minutemen missed him desperately when a stomach bug sent him to the hospital and an MCL sprain kept him off the floor. Returning from both took time, and Cross wasn’t himself the first moments he returned, even though he expected himself to be.

“His expectations for himself are so high, sometimes it got in the way. He’s gotten better as he’s gone through college here. He wants to make every shot. He wants to do everything right. When he doesn’t, he’s mad at himself,” Jim Cross said. “That’s been his thing his whole life. He’s very, very competitive. All he wants to do is win.”

The competitiveness and high expectations are why he gets along so well with Martin. They don’t always see eye to eye but trust where the other is coming from. It’s a comfort Cross hasn’t found in a long time.

“My biggest thing with when I recruit is honesty and loyalty. That’s the way I live my life. Matt’s honest and he’s loyal. He’s not afraid to share his opinion when he doesn’t agree with something. I’m at peace  with that. I like people with personality,” Martin said. “He’s got a good heart, he’s honest and he’s loyal. When you deal with people that are honest and loyal, you can move forward.”

That’s better than moving away.

Kyle Grabowski can be reached at kgrabowski@gazettenet.com. Follow him on Twitter @kylegrbwsk.]]>