Bedford’s Nate Darling wasn’t selected in Wednesday night’s National Basketball Association draft but he moved a step closer to realizing his NBA dream.
ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski tweeted late Wednesday night that the former Delaware and University of Alabama-Birmingham guard had signed a two-way deal with the Charlotte Hornets. Darling is in the United States training so his family watched the draft unfold at home in Nova Scotia while staying in close contact the whole time.
"What we had heard from his agent before the draft was that there were teams in the league that were interested in him and he was in their mix, but unless you're a lottery-type pick no one would ever say 'We're going to draft you,'" said Darling's father Jason, who played for Saint Mary's from 1988 to 1993. "We'd also heard from his agent there would be some type of job offer even if he wasn't drafted. We tried to all mentally prepare ourselves for if he didn't get drafted and that it wouldn't be the end of everything. We knew there were other positives coming but I didn't think it would be as good of an offer as what he got from Charlotte.
"So basically the way it went was when the draft ended, I sent him a text saying 'Listen, this isn't the end for you. It's just one way to get there. There are other ways and you're going to make it.' He said 'Yeah, I know dad, I'm just waiting for a call from my agent.' It was probably two in the morning at that point so I told him I was going to go to bed. But then five minutes later I got a text from him asking if I was still awake. I told him I was and he called me and said he was going to Charlotte. Then I got in trouble from my wife for screaming and waking everybody up."
Jason said Nate is moving to Charlotte next week and Hornets training camp starts Dec. 1. The six-foot-five shooting guard could split time between and the Hornets’ NBA G League affiliate in Greensboro, N.C.
Darling, 22, left Nova Scotia in Grade 10 to advance his basketball career at DeMatha Catholic High School in Maryland. He spent three years at the prep school before joining UAB for the 2016-17 season. He averaged 10.1 points in 33 games during his second season with the Blazers but elected to transfer to Delaware at the end of the year.
After sitting out the required one season for eligibility purposes, Darling averaged 21 points per game and shot 39.9% from three-point range in 2019-20. His scoring average was third in the country and he was a first team All-Conference player for the Colonial Athletic Association.
Darling's 107 three-pointers were a school record and he came up just seven points short of setting a new Delaware mark for points in a single season. His 672 points were the third most in the country.
Darling also represented Canada at the 2017 FIBA World Cup in Cairo, helping the country win a gold medal. He averaged 7.6 points per game in the tournament and scored 12 in the championship win over Italy.
His most notable achievement on Nova Scotia soil came in 2015 when he guided the province to an under-17 national championship. He scored 50 points in a 116-109 overtime win over Ontario in the championship game at Saint Mary's.
