In the offseason after his freshman year with Temple, Aiden Tobiason met with the Owls’ staff. He knew that Temple was set to lose just about all of its highest-usage players, including star guard Jamal Mashburn, and the expectations were laid out clearly.
“We asked him last summer,” head coach Adam Fisher told Nunes Magician. “Are you ready to make a big jump from freshman to sophomore year?”
Fisher told Tobiason that his role would expand from being one of the lowest-usage rotation players in the country into being one of the Owls’ key players, and he lived up to that expectation.
“He was a guy that really wanted to work on his craft all summer,” Fisher said. “He watched a ton of film, and he lived in the gym. He was so coachable. He knew he wanted to make a jump, and he put all the time and work into it.”
Tobiason shined for Temple, going from 4.8 points per contest to 15.3, which was second on the team, while shooting 48% from the field. On the last day of January, Tobiason scored 22 points to lead the Owls to a win over a South Florida team that wouldn’t lose again until the NCAA Tournament. After the game, he joked about how much Tobiason had improved.
“We’ve got to be careful with the nice things we say about players because the transfer portal comes so he needs more work and needs to be back,” he said.
His continued growth over the final month of the season made it impossible for the Owls to retain him. And he committed to Syracuse to join Gerry McNamara’s first team.
So how did Tobiason get better from his freshman to sophomore year?
“I think it started with the strength,” Fisher told Nunes Magician. “When you go from high school to college, it’s a big jump, and I think he got stronger. I thought he really worked on his shot and his explosiveness, too.”
The player that Temple signed out of St. Elizabeth High School in Wilmington, Delaware is much different from the player that the Orange are getting, but Fisher doesn’t want to call him a late bloomer.
“Everybody’s path is different,” Fisher said. “From watching him his senior year of high school to now, he’s made big jumps, so I don’t know if that considers him a late bloomer, but he’s a guy that just continues to get better with each year and every game and practice.”
The American Conference is one of the better mid-major, one-bid leagues in the country. It ranked on KenPom as the 10th-best league in the sport, right between the Missouri Valley and WAC, and Temple finished middle of the pack. Unlike some of Syracuse’s other additions in this cycle coming from conferences ranked 18th (Dual), 20th (Wilson), and 25th (Doty/Goodrick), Tobiason had success last season in a strong league.
And with his long wingspan and athletic tools, Fisher has no concerns about how he’ll translate to the ACC.
“He’s going to translate great,” Fisher said. “I think he’s going to play for an amazing coach in Gerry (McNamara). He’s put together an incredible staff up there, and I think the kid is just a winner. He just finds ways to get better and better and better, and I think he’ll continue to do so.”
Fisher called him a “complete player,” that “earned his way onto the floor with effort, tenacity, and defense,” and then evolved offensively.
And that offensive game left a major impression on Fisher, becoming what the coach called Tobiason’s biggest strength by the end of his sophomore campaign.
“He did a great job being a three-level scorer,” Fisher said. “His ability to knock down open threes. He did a great job getting to the paint, can explode for dunks and good finishes, but he also got that good late clock, get to a spot, pull-up mid-range and knock down a big-time shot.”
Syracuse is hoping that Tobiason can continue to improve. On a roster filled with length and defensive pieces, he’s one of the highest-upside offensive players, and will need to score the ball for the Orange as a junior.
I’ll have a full film breakdown of Tobiason’s game later in the offseason.