Blue Hens add 6-foot-9 basketball recruit with 3-point range

It’s rare to unearth a quality incoming freshman basketball recruit in May, but Delaware basketball coach Martin Ingelsby has done it before and feels he’s found another.

Aleksandar Novakovich, a 6-foot-9, 200-pound forward from Indiana, announced on Twitter Wednesday morning he’d be coming to Delaware later this year. Delaware then announced his signing.

Novakovich, whose parents emigrated from Serbia a few years before he was born, visited UD last weekend and could be seen draining 3-pointers during a three-on-three pick-up game in a Carpenter Center practice gym with players who are now his teammates.

Novakovich this year attended Don Bosco Institute, a prep school in Crown Point, Indiana. He averaged 13 points and seven rebounds per game on a team that included numerous Division I signees, including Maryland and Seton Hall recruits.

He graduated in 2017 from nearby Hobart (Indiana) High having averaged 11.1 points, 7.7 rebounds and 2.8 assists as a senior.

“I graduated when I was 17 so I thought I’d give myself another year physically and just work on my game,” said Novakovich, now 18 and, he hopes, still growing.

He had signed with Evansville (Indiana) last fall. Delaware’s Colonial Athletic Association rival William & Mary had offered him a scholarship prior to prep school, which is certainly a compliment. Novakovich was released from his letter of intent after Evansville fired 11th-year coach Marty Simmons in March.

Novakovich had also considered Marshall this time. Ingelsby’s connections in Indiana, where he played at Notre Dame and served on the Irish coaching staff for 13 years, led him to Novakovich.

Novakovich chose Delaware, he said, because of its management information systems and comfort with the UD players and coaches.

“I felt like I could fit well in their system and be successful at Delaware,” Novakovich said.

He described himself as “a stretch four” who is willing to post up, step away and take a defender to the basket or “pick and pop,” he said.

The day Ingelsby was hired as Delaware coach two years ago this month, he offered a scholarship to Ryan Daly, who’d been Philadelphia Catholic League player of the year at Archbishop Carroll.

Daly had originally committed to Hartford but had reopened his recruiting and accepted Ingelsby’s offer. He led Delaware in scoring the last two years but, for what he termed personal reasons not related to basketball, Daly recently left UD and has transferred to St. Joseph’s, where he has family connections.  

“We are very excited to welcome Aleks Novakovich to the University of Delaware,” Ingelsby said in a UD release. “Aleks is an outstanding young man who fits the type of student-athletes we want to have in our program. On the court he brings size, mobility and a skillset that allows him to stretch the floor to the three-point line.”

Novakovich is the third incoming freshman recruit to join the Blue Hens, joining fall signee Ithiel Horton, a guard, and April signee Matt Veretto, a forward. Ingelsby still has one available scholarship, which he hopes to use on a graduate transfer who’d be eligible immediately in 2018-19, when Delaware will open the season at Maryland.

Two recent transfer additions — guard Nate Darling from Alabama-Birmingham and Justyn Mutts from High Point — must sit out the upcoming season before becoming eligible in 2019-20.

Contact Kevin Tresolini at ktresolini@delawareonline.com. Follow on Twitter @kevintresolini.