His new height complemented existing strengths.
“His tenacity, his passion for the game, his work ethic, all that stuff was there,” Colonia coach Jose Rodriguez said Tuesday. “When I got there, he was a sophomore playing JV and some varsity for us. But then he really took quite the leap. He had a good junior season for us, but his body really started to change after that season. Things took off for him at that point.”
Derkack, who joined Georgia transfer De’Shayne Montgomery in Dayton’s 2025 transfer class, averaged 13.6 points, 7.0 rebounds, 4.8 assists, and 2.0 steals as a senior at Colonia in the 2020-21 season. The program won the Greater Middlesex Conference championship.
At that point, Derkack didn’t have any Division I offers. He was a late bloomer. Recruiting restrictions during the pandemic hurt him as well. Rodriguez said he could have played at the Division II or III level. He reached out to everyone he could to find Derkack a landing spot in college.
“Then ultimately, he took a gamble on himself,” Rodriguez said.
Derkack followed in the footsteps of Colonia graduate Chad Baker-Mazara to Spire. Baker-Mazara spent a post-graduate year at SPIRE before playing at Duquesne, San Diego State, Northwest Florida State Junior College and then finally Auburn, where he was the second-leading scorer for one of the nation’s top teams this past season.
“He was a senior when Jordan was a sophomore,” Rodriguez said. “Jordan took the same bet on himself. He was growing. His game was developing and evolving. His body filled out a lot.”
Rodriguez liked to joke with Derkack by showing him a sophomore-year photo of his jersey slipping off his then-skinny frame. By the time he enrolled at SPIRE, he was a different player.
Even late in his SPIRE season, Derkack lacked Division I offers.
“At what point is ‘D1 interest’ going to turn into a D1 offer for (Derkack),” one coach, Pete Quinn, wrote on X (Twitter) in February 2022. “The kid plays for one of the best prep programs in the country and has proven himself against top teams all season.”
Derkack announced on March 16, 2022, he received an offer from Merrimack and committed to Merrimack on April 1.
Rodriguez said Derkack maintained the same attitude — that he still had to prove he was a legitimate Division I player — from Colonia to SPIRE to Merrimack.
“it’s not like he had a ton of offers even then,” Rodriguez said, “but he capitalized on the chance he did have.”
As a freshman at Merrimack, Derkack’s play improved as the season progressed. He started the last 14 games. Merrimack was 13-1 in that stretch. It ended the regular season with eight straight victories and then won three games in the 2023 Northeast Conference tournament. The NEC championship would have resulted in a NCAA tournament berth except the program was ineligible for a bid because it was in the four-year transition process to Division I.
Fairleigh Dickinson, which Merrimack beat in the NEC championship game, received the league’s automatic bid and became the second No. 16 seed to win a game, upsetting No. 1 seed Purdue in the first round.
Javon Bennett started alongside Derkack during that NEC tournament run.
”We were like, ‘Dang, that should have been us,’” Bennett said in April 2023, “but we kind of knew walking in that we weren’t going to be able to play in March Madness, so we were just focused on winning our last game of the season, and we were able to do that.”
While Bennett left for Dayton after that season, Derkack stayed at Merrimack for his sophomore season. He averaged 17.0 points, 6.0 rebounds and 3.9 assists. He was named the Northeast Conference Player of the Year. He also won the Defensive Player of the Year award, the same honor Bennett won in 2023.
Merrimack again reached the NEC championship game but lost 54-47 to Wagner in the final. Derkack entered the transfer portal a week after the season ended and committed to Rutgers less than a month later.
At Rutgers, Derkack averaged 5.7 points, 2.8 rebounds and 1.5 assists in 31 games. He averaged 17.0 minutes per game and started 10 games. He played 20 or more minutes 10 times in the first 11 games but only three times the rest of the season. With one exception, he played single-digit minutes in the last eight games of the season.
Despite having freshmen Dylan Harper and Ace Bailey, who ESPN projects to be the No. 2 and No. 3 picks in the 2025 NBA Draft, Rutgers finished 15-17.
“The reality is he was a contributing factor on a Big 10 team,” Rodriguez said. “That’s still a pretty big deal. As a competitor, he obviously wanted to do more. He wanted to have a different role. It seemed like it was going in that direction. Then there were some adjustments. That made things a little bit difficult for him. But I thought, typical of him, he handled it with class. He was a great teammate and did all the right things. That was impressive and something I was proud about. Not that I doubted he would do anything different.”
Rodriguez heard from Dayton associate head coach Ricardo Greer during the recruiting process this spring. Derkack also visited Saint Louis before visiting Dayton this past weekend, according to a report by longtime Saint Louis beat writer Stu Durando.
Rodriguez believes Dayton suits Derkack’s style and talent.
“It’s big-time basketball,” Rodriguez said. “They always have a shot to be in the tournament. You’ve got a class-act coach (Anthony Grant), a guy that has done a really good job and has been around for a long time. That’s going to be a great experience for Jordan.”
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