'Nova transfer heading to Penn State

-Courtesy of Penn State University

UNIVERSITY PARK, PA., Jan. 29, 2008 – The Nittany Lion basketball added size to its front line Tuesday when coach Ed DeChellis announced the addition of 6-10, 230-pound forward Andrew Ott (Abington, Pa.) to the program. Formerly a redshirt freshman at Villanova, Ott announced his decision to transfer from the Wildcat program on Sunday. He was registered for classes on Penn State’s University Park campus beginning on Tuesday.

“We’re very excited to have Andrew join our program,” DeChellis said. “We recruited him pretty hard coming out of high school, so we know Andrew and his family pretty well. He’s a great kid who really fits well with our program and on our roster. We were looking to add a big front line player in the late spring singing period and Andrew is the kind of big, skilled player that is hard to find.”

Ott will be eligible to play for the Nittany Lions following the completion of finals in the 2008 fall semester. He will begin next season as a sophomore and have 2 ½ years of eligibility remaining at Penn State.

“We plan on Andrew being eligible to play for us in late December next year,” DeChellis said. “He’s already a pretty seasoned player having been in the college game for the last year and a half and brings a big body and strong skill set with him. He can step our away from the basket and shoot it, has good post moves and is a strong rebounder.”

A skilled big man with excellent shooting touch, Ott redshirted the 2006-07 season at Villanova and played sparingly for Jay Wright’s Wildcats this season seeing action in four games, a total of 16 minutes of action and scoring three points. He last played in an 81-71 Villanova win at Syracuse last Saturday.

“Andrew has been an outstanding member of the Villanova basketball family and we are going to miss him,” said Wright in a Villanova press release. “While we are sad to see Andrew go, it is important to our coaching staff to support our players in pursuing their goals.”

Ott was a 1,000-point scorer at Germantown Academy outside of Philadelphia, a school that produced such recent college standouts as Matt Walsh at Florida and Lee Melchionni at Duke. He helped a young team to a 17-12 record in his senior season. He averaged 14 points and 11 rebounds as a junior and improved to 19.2 points and 15 rebounds a game as a senior scoring 1,074 career points. He was recruited by Penn State, North Carolina, Wake Forest, Purdue, Notre Dame and Illinois among others out of high school. Ott is familiar with the Big Ten with his older brother, Ryan, and father, Michael, both attending Purdue.