First off, yes there were legit kids.
Secondly, winning a 3 point shooting contest is flashy, but not terribly meaningful (as he said, he's never shot 3s off of a ballrack).
The other thing to remember is that while I have not seen a ton of him playing, it's absolutely not fair to compare him to a Ryne Smith. A lot of his game is within the 3 point arc and he went to the free throw line a lot. He's definitely not a stand there and wait to shoot a 3 pointer type of guy. Obviously in college, particularly early on, he's not going to have the strength to do as much of that. But don't think that this guy is just a spot-up 3 point shooter.