The rapper J Cole — who just released a new album called “The Off-Season” — made his debut in the first regular-season game for Basketball Africa League over the weekend.
- Cole scored three points in his debut.
- His team, the Patriots Basketball Club of Rwanda, defeated Nigeria’s Rivers Hoopers, 83-60.
- “In his professional basketball debut, Jermaine Cole scored three points, with two assists and three rebounds,” the BAL said in a press release sent to the Deseret News.
Per BBC News, Patriots coach Alan Major said he was proud of Cole’s success in the game, which was the rapper’s professional debut.
- “I talked to him in the locker room — I said, ‘I am so proud of you,’ because he was very frustrated with himself,” Major said.
- “He had a couple of turnovers. I said, don’t put too much pressure on yourself — the only mistake he can ever make is to just not to try again,” he added, according to BBC News.
- “Our guys have embraced him, he has embraced them — and the beautiful thing about him is just wants to be a basketball player,” Major said, per BBC News. “He is not interested in being an entertainer in this event, he just wants to be a basketball player.”
The Basketball Africa League is a league created in partnership with the International Basketball Federation and the National Basketball Association. The league includes 12 teams from throughout Africa and represents the “NBA’s first collaboration to operate a league outside North America.”