Chudier Bile has collected plenty of stamps on the basketball version of his passport since he left Denver.
All those twists and turns have led to a collision course with the flagship university of his hometown state in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.
Bile, a graduate transfer for the 12th-seeded Georgetown Hoyas, is a 2016 graduate of Denver South who has been a key addition this season for the Hoyas and their Hall of Fame coach, Patrick Ewing.
Bile was named Class 4A honorable mention all-state by the Denver Post as a junior in 2015 and earned that same honor from CHSAA a year later. He spent his first two collegiate seasons at Otero Junior College before transferring to Bradley, but he never played a game there before leaving in July of 2019.
This time, Bile landed at Northwestern State University, where during the 2019-20 season he enjoyed a breakout campaign by averaging 14.3 points and 7.6 rebounds with 41 blocked shots in 28 games. Bile was a second-team All-Southland Conference selection last season but opted to take a shot at a bigger stage.
It has paid off for the 6-foot-7 Bile, who has flourished down the stretch for Ewing and the surging Hoyas.
“He’s come a long way,” Ewing said. “He started out real strong for us in practice when he first got here. Hurt his foot, took like three weeks off, and then other people went past him. I don’t remember which game it was, but there was a particular game that he was playing lights-out in the first half, and I just made the switch in the second half and started him. And he hasn’t left the starting lineup yet.
Bile has started the past 13 games for the Hoyas, who won four games in four days last week to claim the automatic bid out of the Big East Conference. The Denver South grad posted consecutive double-doubles three weeks ago against DePaul (19 points, 10 rebounds) and Xavier (16 points, 11 rebounds). He also played a key role in the Hoyas’ rout of Creighton in the Big East title game, going 7-for-13 with 19 points and eight rebounds.
Bile enters the first-round battle against the Buffs averaging 10.2 points and 5.1 rebounds with a .403 shooting percentage. He has shot .393 (35-for-89) from 3-point range.
“I love his toughness. I love his athleticism. And I keep trying to tell him, ‘Look, for a person who’s athletic, you need to use it a lot more. His toughness, being able to get to the free throw line, being able to defend and shoot the three, that helps us significantly.”
