NBA opens Africa academy in push for international recruits
By Nellie Peyton
DAKAR, May 4 (Reuters) - The National Basketball Association opened its first education academy in Africa on Thursday in a push to extend its presence on the continent and put together extra African gamers to enter the league, its vice-president for Africa stated.
The academy is based inside the seaside West African kingdom of Senegal, in which a sports activities improvement program in partnership with the NBA has already produced professional gamers such as Minnesota Timberwolves centre-ahead Gorgui Dieng.
"The intention of the NBA Academy Africa is to create a more direct path for young human beings who have expertise in order that their destiny isn't determined via chance," Amadou Gallo Fall instructed journalists in Senegal's capital Dakar.
The academy is part of a push to amplify recruitment worldwide and follows 3 academies which were released in China last year. Two greater are slated to open in India and Australia.
The number of global players in the NBA has been growing, with a report 113 on beginning night rosters for the 2016-17 season. But most are European, with simplest 14 from Africa.
Basketball has lengthy been eclipsed with the aid of football at the continent, in which even former superstars such as Nigeria's Hakeem Olajuwon did no longer learn how to play till their past due teenagers.
"If you may find a child from Africa that could shoot the ball, that is form of unique. Why? Because he would not have the resources," stated the academy's technical director Roland Houston, as 20 lanky young adults practiced at a training camp in the Senegalese city of Thies in advance this week.
The NBA academy will construct at the Sports for Education and Economic Development (SEED) Project, which has skilled young players in Senegal since it became based in 2002.
Twelve gamers may be selected to join the inaugural class. All will acquire scholarships to the academy, in an effort to additionally provide instructional guides and mentoring.
"I see basketball as something that ... Has already taken me places. Basketball has made me meet people I in no way predicted to satisfy, humans I by no means wanted I ought to even shake fingers with," stated Timothy Ighoeffe, 17, one of the hopefuls from Nigeria.
The NBA is also counting on the pass to assist it attain new audiences in Africa, wherein it has slowly been constructing its logo. It held its first African exhibition sport in Johannesburg, South Africa in 2015 and signed a main trans-African broadcast deal remaining year. (Reporting via Nellie Peyton; Editing through Joe Bavier)
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