TORONTO -- As the young son of Austrian national team volleyball players, Jakob Poeltl knew he'd grow up to play sports.

But in a mountainous country known for churning out world-class skiers, basketball was barely on the radar. So the day after the seven-foot centre became the first Austrian drafted into the NBA, Poeltl pointed to his mom Martina and dad Rainer for instilling in him a love of sports.

Their support pathed his unlikely journey from Austria to the Toronto Raptors.

"Even as a little kid, I was always in the gym," Poeltl said. "Them playing volleyball I was like being the ball boy actually, just running around, playing around. I was super active because I grew up in this family of athletes, a very active family.

"So for me as a kid, it was pretty obvious that I would play a sport. And it was basketball, it was pretty random, but I loved it and I never looked back."

The Raptors selected the seven-foot forward from the University of Utah with the No. 9 pick in Thursday night's NBA draft, and Ujiri said, with Poeltl's background -- and his obvious love of the game -- choosing him was a no-brainer.

"When you see a big guy who loves to play, his parents were athletes and he grew up in a sports environment, and loves the game of basketball and loves to be in the gym, you just run and hug him and take him and run," Ujiri said, with a laugh.

"Because you don't find them. A lot of big guys are pushed to play, right? That's the reality of life. You're seven feet, so go play basketball. This kid loves to play, he loves the game of basketball."

Poeltl's parents, plus sister Miriam and friend Jan were on hand as the 20-year-old, dressed in a navy blue suit and scuffed grey running shoes, was introduced to the media Friday at BioSteel Centre. Poeltl posed holding his new No. 42 Raptors jersey.

Ujiri indicated he'd had his eye on Poeltl for the last two years. In his freshman season, Poeltl held Jahlil Okafor to a season-low six points in the NCAA tournament. Okafor then went No. 3 in last year's draft.

And he's coming off a sophomore season that saw him earn the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Award as the NCAA's top centre. He posted a career-high 32 points versus Temple and 18 rebounds in a win over Duke.

It's still "a little unbelievable," Poeltl said, on being the NBA's first Austrian, considering it would be difficult to even watch NBA games while he was growing up in Vienna. Games weren't on TV, and he would've had to stay up until 3 a.m. to watch them online.

His parents took him to his first NBA game -- the Knicks versus the Washington Wizards -- at Madison Square Garden, when he was 14.

A Utah assistant coach eventually spotted the player at an under-18 European tournament.

Now, Poeltl is a player with "great hands, loves to run, and moves his feet well," Ujiri said. "And he's got a good sense and feel for the game. . . loves to roll hard to the basket."

"And to me, big guys just continue to get better. And what you see is what we said about (Jonas Valanciunas), when we first got J.V. Where J.V. is now, it's not even close to where he's going to be three years from now. This kid, same thing. It has really made us super excited about where our franchise could be in the future."

He was also at ease in the spotlight Friday, cracking jokes with reporters. Ujiri divulged that Poeltl had scored 27 points on Valanciunas in an Austria-Lithuania friendly last summer. Asked about it, Poeltl said: "Is that gonna be a thing now?"

Asked who he was most looking forward to playing with, he said: "I gotta pick a favourite already?"

"I feel like it's going to be great matching up with Jonas Valanciunas in practice, really," he added, diplomatically. "I'm looking forward to learning from him, learning from his experience here in the NBA, he's been here a couple years already."

The Raptors' No. 27 pick, Pascal Siakam, hasn't yet arrived in Toronto.