Fast-rising guard Aiden Tobiason commits to Temple
Just two days after it received its first verbal commitment from the 2024 class, Temple continued its recruiting roll and landed another commitment from one of the most improved players in the Northeast.
Aiden Tobiason, a 6-foot-5 guard from Delaware’s St. Elizabeth High School and the Role Model Elite AAU program, announced his verbal commitment to Temple Thursday afternoon on Instagram.
Less than two months ago, Tobiason didn’t have a Division I offer.
Then things changed quickly.
His first offer came from Sacred Heart. Then Delaware, Delaware State and UMBC followed. He scored 12 points in a win over Sankofa and 17 in a win over Episcopal Academy in September at the CoBL Interstate Shootout. Then on Oct. 24, Tobiason opened more eyes by dropping 35 points – including four three-pointers – and 10 rebounds in St. Elizabeth’s win over Neumann-Goretti.
Owls head coach Adam Fisher, who had hosted Tobiason on an unofficial visit earlier in the month, called soon after with a scholarship offer, and Tobiason was back at Temple less than a week later for an official visit.
He verbally committed to Fisher and his staff last Saturday before making his decision public Thursday.
Ari Rosenfeld, the co-founder and scouting director at Elite High School Scouting, believes Fisher and the Owls got a steal in Tobiason.
“You have a rare case of a prospect truly coming out of nowhere in an era where that’s almost impossible,” Rosenfeld told OwlScoop.com. “He’s a classic late bloomer who’s added to his frame throughout high school and will still barely be 18 when he gets to campus. And what’s exciting is, not having been in a highly touted or hyped player for so long, he has almost no bad habits to work out before college.
“With his ability to make shots at a high clip, read the floor, his length and athleticism and a humble approach, he’s the exact type of guard Fisher wants to build with, with the ceiling to continue to get a whole lot better into college once he’s around high-level players and development consistently for the first time.”
St. Elizabeth head coach Mike Cassidy and his staff always thought the potential was there for Tobiason to become a high-major Division I college player.
The growth, he said, started last season before it really accelerated over the summer and into the fall.
“Last year as a junior, he started to kind of fill the main scoring role,” Cassidy told OwlScoop.com. “We always kind of had it in the back of our head -- when he comes into his body, grows and matures a little bit, we'd like to see, what's his ceiling? And toward the end of his junior year, we really realized, wow, this kid is lights out from the three. And then he really started to understand going into his senior summer, I kind of have to take (more control and another step in his game.)
“Aiden is very team ball first, and he kind of realized that if I don't get these shots up … I’ve got to take on a main scoring role. And so he did this summer and really came into his own in the fall as well, and we're excited for senior year.”
With good reason.
Tobiason’s recent performance against Neumann-Goretti confirmed what Cassidy and his staff already knew about his game, and Cassidy believes it even opened up Tobiason’s own eyes to play as well as he did against a perennial Philadelphia Catholic League power and one of the better programs in the Northeast.
“I think it's a huge confidence boost for him,” Cassidy said. “I think that he probably did set out that game with something to prove. Neumann-Goretti is obviously a well-respected program, and I think that he just kind of had in the back of his head like, I want to be aggressive, and good things happened for him in that game.”
Things aligned for both Tobiason and Temple soon after, and Cassidy believes his star player will be a good fit for the Owls.
“I think that with the style of play he wants to play, I think Aiden is buying into what his role would be,” Cassidy said. “That was first. But then I think that Aiden is also pretty savvy to the rich basketball history that Temple has, so think it's just a combination of both.
“Good timing.”
Tobiason became the second player from the 2024 class to commit to Temple just two days after Lancaster (Texas) High School forward Dillon Battie, the son of former Owls forward Derrick Battie, offered his verbal pledge to Temple, choosing the Owls over offers from programs like Oklahoma, Oklahoma State and Washington.
Without any future roster movement, a rarity in today's college basketball landscape, Temple would head into the 2024-25 season with the full allotment of 13 scholarships. Fisher and his staff have continued to prioritize some of the top players in the area in the 2025 class, including Perkiomen School point guard KJ Cochran, Penn Charter guard Kai Shinholster and Cristo Rey shooting guard Devin Booker.