Robbie Heath grew up on the outskirts of Melbourne, in the basketball hotbed of Whittlesea, around 40 minutes from the CDB.
Much like Ben Simmons, Dante Exum and even Kyrie Irving, Heath is a product of one of the many US imports who came to Australia in the 1980s and 1990s to play basketball.
His father Bobby was born in Philadelphia and came to Australia and played in the state leagues before meeting his wife Kerri and starting a family.
He moved to the US to play at Abington High School, his father’s alma mater, where he had considerable success. Playing in the 2017-18 Montverde Academy Invitational Tournament, run by the elite basketball academy that produced RJ Barrett, D’Angelo Russell, and Ben Simmons, he was named to the tournament’s all-first team alongside NBA stars RJ Barrett (New York) and Bol Bol (Denver). Robbie also finished as the school’s third all-time leading scorer with 1,642 points
Despite this success, he was unable to gain the attention of NCAA Division I teams. The 19cm guard had always chosen to spend the off-season in Australia rather than play AAU ball, where a lot of college recruitment is done. Heath emailed every D-I program he could think of, some responded to him, but none showed genuine interest. With nowhere else to go, he signed with the Division II school West Chester University, a school located near his high school and one of the few programs that had actually seen him play and offered him a scholarship.
With a chip on his shoulder, Heath destroyed all comers in the Division II competition and smashed every scoring first-year scoring record held at West Chester. He was the highest-scoring freshman in the entire NCAA, averaging 24.6 points a game. Heath also led the Golden Rams in rebounding (7.3), assists (2.6) and steals (1.6), leading all of Division II in free throws attempted and was second in makes.
The 21-year-old guard even dropped 50 points one round and finished his Freshman season ranked as the best first-year player in the entire NCAA.
His freshman year was more than enough for Divison I schools to start contacting Heath, and in April, he was offered a three-year scholarship to play with Pepperdine University.
The path to success is never a straight line, and Heath had achieved what he set out to do when he left Australia as a young teenager.
“It was always my goal to play Division I but I had to jump through a lot of hurdles to get to where I wanted to be. West Chester, a Division II school, was my only scholarship offer and I’m very thankful to them. But after what I did this year I put my name in the transfer portal” said Heath.
“Pepperdine’s getting a hard worker that just wants to win. I’m a team player. I can score, rebound and pass, but really, I just want to win. Coach Lorenzo is starting a winning culture at Pepperdine and I can’t wait to be part of it.”
The Pepperdine Waves coaching staff feel that have a player that will be a big part of the team’s success over the coming seasons.
“Robbie is strong, he’s athletic, he’s aggressive. We looked at our roster for the future and knew that we needed scoring, especially a guard that can really score, and as we looked around he certainly fit the bill,” said Pepperdine coach Lorenzo Romar on signing Heath.
Heath saw sporadic playing time in his sophomore season with Pepperdine due to acclimatising to an established club amid a COVID impacted NCAA season. He was only able to play in seven games during his first year with the Waves but is ready for a break out season in his first full year of Divison I basketball.
Making the most of his off-season in Australia Heath is also lining up for the Diamond Valley Eagles in this years NBL1 competition. In the teams, last two games his offensive talents were on display when he dropped 21 points in 20 minutes against Hobart and the very next day had 16 points in his first 13 minutes against NW Tasmania.
He might be an unknown right now, but when Robbie Heath’s name is on the tongues of NBL in two years time, remember you heard it here first.