Panola College lands 7-foot Australian center Eden Horowitz on full scholarship
Eden Horowitz gave Panola College something every NJCAA coach wants and very few can find: a true 7-foot center on a full scholarship. The Victoria, Australia native committed to the Ponies with a profile that instantly changes the math in the paint, because size like that can erase mistakes, finish lobs, and force opponents to rethink how they attack the rim.
The move fits a Panola program that is acting like a team with real urgency and real ambition. Robert Rollinson was promoted to head coach on July 25, 2025 after serving as an assistant during the Ponies’ 2024-25 run, when Panola won the Region XIV Athletic Conference championship and reached the Final Four at the NJCAA national tournament. A player like Horowitz is not a luxury piece in that setting. He is the kind of frontcourt addition that can help a team keep its edge while it reloads.
Horowitz’s commitment also shows where junior-college roster building has gone. Panola did not have to look only in Texas or the Southeast to find immediate help. It went to Australia for a seven-footer whose length gives the program a different kind of defensive ceiling and a different kind of offensive spacing around the basket. In NJCAA basketball, that matters because one big body can change how a roster functions from the first day of practice.
The pathway that brought Horowitz to Carthage has become familiar across the sport. AUSA Hoops, which said it has been building its recruiting pipeline since 2013, has placed more than 340 players in the United States and runs boys AAU tours that put prospects in front of college coaches at major American events. The company says a single tournament can draw anywhere from 100 to 1,500 college coaches, which explains why international prospects with size and upside keep showing up on junior-college boards.
Horowitz also arrives with a more defined background than a raw height listing suggests. Australian basketball databases list his most recent team as Victoria Navy U20 in the Australian U20 Championship, and scouting information places him in Melbourne, Victoria at 7-foot-0. That is the sort of profile Panola can sell immediately: a young big man with state-level experience, a full ride, and the chance to grow inside one of the NJCAA’s most visible frontcourt pipelines.