Three months after the sophomore point guard withdrew from the NBA draft and transferred from Dayton to the USF, Mike Sharavjamts is a major source of pride for one of the nation’s largest Mongolian populations.

Between 8,000 and 10,000 Mongolians are believed to live in the Bay Area, many of whom are among the 7,400 followers on USF’s newly launched Facebook page for Mongolian fans. At 6-foot-8, 180 pounds, with smooth ballhandling and elite court vision, Sharavjamts isn’t just Mongolia’s first NBA prospect — he is its first athlete of any kind at the NCAA Division I level.

By charting new territory in the country’s second most popular sport (behind Mongolian wrestling), he has earned iconic status. Three months ago, while visiting his hometown of Ulaanbaatar, Sharavjamts couldn’t leave his parents’ house without being hounded for photos. A popular Mongolian news network recently released a documentary about him that has a quarter-million views on YouTube.

Though shy by nature, Sharavjamts — “Mongolian Mike” to his supporters — hardly minds the attention. This has been his goal for as long as he can remember.

In 2009, at age 7, he was leaving Buyant Ukhaa Sport Palace in Ulaanbaatar with his father, Tserenjankhar (SAR-in-jong-car), when Tserenjankhar stopped outside their car. A 7-foot center who rose to international fame during his three-year stretch as the Harlem Globetrotters’ “Mongolian Shark,” Tserenjankhar had just played his final professional game in Mongolia’s top league.

Reaching into his duffel bag, he pulled out his XXXL jersey and handed it to his son. In that moment, without a word being uttered, the second-grader understood what was happening.

Over the next five years, Sharavjamts would arrive at the Sport Palace — Mongolia’s premier athletic facility — by 8 a.m. five days a week to work through drills with his father. Around 1 p.m., Sharavjamts took an elevator to the second floor, where his school was located.

Shortly after his 12th birthday, he was among a small group of players selected for the United States Basketball Academy, a program in rural central Oregon that helps Asian-born players acclimate to America’s grassroots system. Sharavjamts knew just one English word: “Hi.”

Finally cleared to fly stateside again in summer 2021, he settled in southwestern Ohio with a cousin and began playing travel ball with Midwest Basketball Club. At an AAU tournament, Dave Briski, head coach at International Sports Academy outside Cleveland, became mesmerized with the gangly Mongolian’s court awareness and instincts. Without breaking stride, Sharavjamts would hit teammates with no-look passes.

Briski asked around. Despite a brief stint playing alongside future No. 2 NBA draft pick Jalen Green at Prolific Prep in Napa, Sharavjamts was a relative unknown with no Division I offers.

The NCAA hadn’t certified Mongolia’s academic programs, because no one from the sparsely populated country wedged between Russia and China had tried to play at the Division I or Division II level in any sport. But within a few months of playing a national schedule with International Sports Academy, Sharavjamts had rocketed up recruiting lists and piled up high-major scholarship offers.

Meanwhile, he almost didn’t notice that he was building a massive online following. Last fall, when he became just the second true freshman in a decade to start for Dayton, he had over 175,000 Instagram followers. The Flyers’ Facebook page for Mongolian fans would rack up almost 30,000.

Sharavjamts captained Mongolia’s Under-18 national team at the 2019 3-on-3 World Cup in Ulaanbaatar, but he didn’t become a household name there until his recent foray into the NBA’s predraft process. Reports of his workouts with over a half-dozen teams were national news.

What many Mongolians didn’t know was that the Milwaukee Bucks promised to take Sharavjamts with the 58th and final pick if he stayed in the draft. But since they could guarantee him only a two-way contract, he returned to college and scoured the NCAA’s transfer portal for a new school.

“Mike’s got some intriguing size and versatility,” said an NBA scout, who spoke under the condition of anonymity so he could talk freely. “To be a legitimate NBA player, he needs to increase his output considerably.”

After an underwhelming freshman season at Dayton in which he averaged 5.6 points in 23.1 minutes per game, Sharavjamts wanted more of a chance to showcase his skill set. USF, which had lost its starting backcourt of Khalil Shabazz and Tyrell Roberts to the pros, offered him a big-time role.

It also gave Sharavjamts something no other program pursuing him could: the opportunity to connect with the nation’s second-biggest Mongolian community. Though he had become familiar with the Bay Area’s Mongolian presence during his time at Prolific Prep, he wasn’t aware of its full extent until the Consul General of Mongolia in San Francisco, Urgamaltsetseg Bandikhuu, invited him to dinner during his official recruiting visit.

While feasting on a Mongolian noodle dish called tsuivan as Mongolian wrestling played on TV, Sharavjamts talked with Bandikhuu about their favorite hikes back home. USF staffers could sense that Sharavjamts felt more at ease.

“It was unlike any recruiting visit I’ve ever been a part of,” said Dons head coach Chris Gerlufsen, whose roster boasts players from eight countries. “You could just tell how much it meant to him being around fellow Mongolians.”

Many Americans know Mongolia as an almost mystical land of snow leopards, eagle hunters on horseback and picturesque mountain ranges. But it’s a country plagued with problems.

Russia and China have long treated landlocked Mongolia as a geopolitical pawn. In addition to being the world’s coldest capital city, Ulaanbaatar is the one with the highest recorded levels of air pollution.

More than a third of its 1.5 million citizens live below the poverty line. To cope with the brutal winters, many people develop a taste for fermented mare’s milk known as kumis, an alcoholic drink that bubbles like Champagne.