Nikola Jović ( sr-Cyrl, Никола Јовић, ; born 9 June 2003) is a Serbian professional

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...

player for the

Miami Heat The Miami Heat are an American professional basketball team based in Miami. The Heat compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the league's Eastern Conference (NBA), Eastern Conference Southeast Division (NBA), Southe ...

of the

National Basketball Association The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional basketball league in North America. The league is composed of 30 teams (29 in the United States and 1 in Canada) and is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United S ...

(NBA). He was selected 27th overall by the Heat in the 2022 NBA draft.

Early career

Jović was born in the

Royal Infirmary Royal Infirmary may refer to a number of hospitals in the United Kingdom: *England ** Blackburn Royal Infirmary **Bradford Royal Infirmary ** Bolton Royal Infirmary **Bristol Royal Infirmary **Chester Royal Infirmary **Derbyshire Royal Infirmary * ...

Leicester Leicester ( ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, city, Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority and the county town of Leicestershire in the East Midlands of England. It is the largest settlement in the East Midlands. The city l ...

Leicestershire Leicestershire ( ; postal abbreviation Leics.) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the East Midlands, England. The county borders Nottinghamshire to the north, Lincolnshire to the north-east, Rutland to the east, Northamptonshire t ...

, England due to his professional basketball player father Ilija playing there at the time. He grew up playing

water polo Water polo is a competitive team sport played in water between two teams of seven players each. The game consists of four quarters in which the teams attempt to score goals by throwing the ball into the opposing team's goal. The team with the ...

for

VK Partizan Vaterpolo klub Partizan ( sr-cyr, Ватерполо клуб Партизан) is a professional water polo club based in Belgrade, Serbia. VK Partizan is one of the sports clubs in Serbia that is part of sport society Partizan. As of 2021–22 ...

as well as basketball. Jović was playing basketball for the KK Sava

youth system In sporting terminology, a youth system (or youth academy) is a youth investment program within a particular team or league, which develops and nurtures young talent in farm teams, with the vision of using them in the first team in the future if ...

before he joined the Mega Basket youth system in 2018. At the 2021–22 Euroleague Basketball Next Generation Tournament in the Serbian capital

Belgrade Belgrade ( , ;, ; Names of European cities in different languages: B, names in other languages) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Serbia, largest city in Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers a ...

, he averaged 29.3 points, 10.3 rebounds, 4.5 assists and 1.8 blocks in 28 minutes per game, while shooting 66% from the

field Field may refer to: Expanses of open ground * Field (agriculture), an area of land used for agricultural purposes * Airfield, an aerodrome that lacks the infrastructure of an airport * Battlefield * Lawn, an area of mowed grass * Meadow, a grass ...

and 17% from

three 3 is a number, numeral, and glyph. 3, three, or III may also refer to: * AD 3, the third year of the AD era * 3 BC, the third year before the AD era * March, the third month Books * '' Three of Them'' (Russian: ', literally, "three"), a 1901 ...

and won the MVP award.

Professional career

Mega Basket (2021–2022)

Jović made his senior debut for Mega Basket in February 2021 at the

Radivoj Korać Cup The Radivoj Korać Cup ( sr, Куп Радивоја Кораћа / Kup Radivoja Koraća) is the men's national basketball cup of Serbia. It is run by the Basketball Federation of Serbia and is named after a Serbian basketball legend and FIBA Ha ...

tournament in

Novi Sad Novi Sad ( sr-Cyrl, Нови Сад, ; hu, Újvidék, ; german: Neusatz; see below for other names) is the second largest city in Serbia and the capital of the autonomous province of Vojvodina. It is located in the southern portion of the Pan ...

. On 19 March, Jović made his

ABA League The ABA League, renamed to the ABA League First Division in 2017, is the 1st-tier regional men's professional basketball league that originally featured clubs from the former Yugoslavia (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Montenegro, North Mace ...

debut in a 74–65 loss to

Split Split(s) or The Split may refer to: Places * Split, Croatia, the largest coastal city in Croatia * Split Island, Canada, an island in the Hudson Bay * Split Island, Falkland Islands * Split Island, Fiji, better known as Hạfliua Arts, enterta ...

recording 10 points and 9 rebounds in 21 minutes of playing time. On 10 June 2021, one day after his 18th birthday he signed his first professional contract with Mega. In the

NBA.com The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional basketball league in North America. The league is composed of 30 teams (29 in the United States and 1 in Canada) and is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United St ...

GM Survey for the

2021–22 NBA season The 2021–22 NBA season was the 76th season of the National Basketball Association (NBA). The NBA returned to a full 82-game regular season in its normal mid-October to mid-April schedule for the first time since the 2018–19 NBA season, af ...

, Jović received votes for the best international player not playing in the NBA. In April 2022, he was named the ABA League Top Prospect for the 2021–22 season. During the 2021–22 season, Jović averaged 11.7 points while shooting 42.8 percent from the field, 35.6 percent on threes and 75.4 percent from the

free throw In basketball, free throws or foul shots are unopposed attempts to score points by shooting from behind the free-throw line (informally known as the foul line or the charity stripe), a line situated at the end of the Key (basketball), restricted ...

, 4.4 rebounds, 3.4 assists to 2.7 turnovers and 0.4 blocks per game in 25 appearances.

Miami Heat (2022–present)

In April 2022, Jović declared for the 2022 NBA draft. On 23 June 2022, Jović attended the 2022 NBA draft held at the

Barclays Center Barclays Center is a multi-purpose list of indoor arenas, indoor arena in the New York City Boroughs of New York City, borough of Brooklyn. The arena is home to the Brooklyn Nets of the National Basketball Association and the New York Liberty o ...

Brooklyn, New York Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

. He was selected with the 27th overall pick by the

in the Draft. Jović officially signed a multi-year rookie scale contract with the Heat on 2 July 2022. In July 2022, he joined the Heat for the

NBA Summer League The NBA Summer League, also known as the Las Vegas Summer League, is an off-season competition organized by the National Basketball Association. NBA teams come together to try out different summer rosters instead of their regular season line-ups ...

. On 23 October 2022, Jović was suspended for one game without pay for leaving the bench during an altercation between the Heat and the

Toronto Raptors The Toronto Raptors are a Canadian professional basketball team based in Toronto. The Raptors compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the league's Eastern Conference Atlantic Division. They play their home games a ...

the night before. He was assigned to the

NBA G League The NBA G League, or simply the G League, is the National Basketball Association's (NBA) official List of developmental and minor sports leagues, minor league basketball organization. The league was known as the National Basketball Development ...

on 30 December 2022. Jović made the 2023 NBA Finals but the Heat lost the series in 5 games to the

Denver Nuggets The Denver Nuggets are an American professional basketball team based in Denver. The Nuggets compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the league's Western Conference Northwest Division. The team was founded as the D ...

National team career

Jović missed the 2019 FIBA U16 European Championship in

Udine Udine ( , ; fur, Udin; la, Utinum) is a city and ''comune'' in north-eastern Italy, in the middle of the Friuli Venezia Giulia region, between the Adriatic Sea and the Alps (''Alpi Carniche''). Its population was 100,514 in 2012, 176,000 with t ...

, Italy due to a

right arm This is a general glossary of the terminology used in the sport of cricket. Where words in a sentence are also defined elsewhere in this article, they appear in italics. Certain aspects of cricket terminology are explained in more detail in cr ...

injury. In July 2021, Jović was a member of the Serbia U19 national team at the

FIBA Under-19 Basketball World Cup The FIBA Under-19 Basketball World Cup (formerly FIBA Under-19 World Championship) is the under-19 men's world basketball championship organised by the International Basketball Federation (FIBA). From its inauguration in 1979, until 2007, it was ...

. Over seven tournament games, he averaged 18.1 points, 8.3 rebounds, and 2.9 assists per game. He was named to the all-tournament team. In February 2022, Jović made his debut for the Serbia national team at the 2023 FIBA World Cup Qualifiers, at the age of 18. Initially at the preliminary Serbia roster for

EuroBasket 2022 The EuroBasket 2022 was the 41st edition of the EuroBasket championship organized by FIBA Europe. It was the first since it was agreed it would take place every four years, with a similar system of qualification as for the FIBA Basketball World C ...

, Jović was cut from the squad due to disapproval of the Heat.

Career statistics

NBA

Regular season

, - , style="text-align:left;", , style="text-align:left;",

Miami Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a East Coast of the United States, coastal metropolis and the County seat, county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade C ...

, 15 , , 8 , , 13.6 , , .406 , , .229 , , .947 , , 2.1 , , .7 , , .5 , , .1 , , 5.5 , - class="sortbottom" , style="text-align:center;" colspan="2", Career , 15 , , 8 , , 13.6 , , .406 , , .229 , , .947 , , 2.1 , , .7 , , .5 , , .1 , , 5.5

Playoffs

, - , style="text-align:left;",

2023 Events Predicted and scheduled events * January 1 ** In the United States, books, films, and other works published in 1927 will enter the public domain, assuming there are no changes made to copyright law. ** Croatia will adopt the eu ...

, style="text-align:left;",

, 7 , , 0 , , 1.8 , , .250 , , .000 , , , , .7 , , .0 , , .0 , , .0 , , .3 , - class="sortbottom" , style="text-align:center;" colspan="2", Career , 7 , , 0 , , 1.8 , , .250 , , .000 , , , , .7 , , .0 , , .0 , , .0 , , .3

References

External links

Profile
at euroleague.net
Profile
at

realgm.com RealGM.com is a sports website created in 2000. The site was originally a basketball site, but has since expanded its scope to provide information about American football, baseball, ice hockey and soccer. According to Alexa, the site ranked in the ...

Profile
at

eurobasket.com Eurobasket.com also commonly referred to as "Eurobasket News", is a basketball-centered website that provide coverages of every professional and semi-professional leagues around the world. Although primarily focusing on European basketball, th ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jovic, Nikola 2003 births Living people 2023 FIBA Basketball World Cup players ABA League players Basketball players from Belgrade British expatriate basketball people in Serbia English men's basketball players English people of Serbian descent KK Mega Basket players Miami Heat draft picks Miami Heat players National Basketball Association players from the United Kingdom National Basketball Association players from England National Basketball Association players from Serbia Power forwards (basketball) Serbia men's national basketball team players Serbian expatriate basketball people in the United States Serbian men's basketball players Sioux Falls Skyforce players Small forwards Sportspeople from Leicester