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Dikembe Mutombo, Hall of Famer and global basketball ambassador, was ‘larger than life’

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In March 2022, many Senegalese were desirous to return home as they stood outside the gates of the Senegalese International Airport. John F. Kennedy together with his beloved African son who desired to spread the gospel of the NBA even further. His name was Dikembe Mutombo Mpolondo Mukamba Jean-Jacques Wamutombo.

Before the 2-meter-tall resident of the Republic of Congo boarded the needed first-class seat in Dakar, took every photo, signed every autograph and participated in every finger wave within the video: “No, no, no…” he was asked with a smile and and not using a hint of irritation. While Mutombo will be the most intimidating shot blocker in NBA history, his biggest impact was as a mild giant and humanitarian off the court. The famous basketball player selflessly made his native Africa and the world a greater place before he died on Monday on the age of 58 after an extended battle with brain cancer.

“I’ve come to realize that I don’t live alone in this world,” Mutombo told Andscape in 2022 in Dakar while attending Basketball Africa League games. “I live in a world surrounded by individuals with different cultures, different languages, people from different places and different islands. I’m not in search of who’s Congolese and who’s African.

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“I just look for the people who are out there. I come to this point to say, what kind of investment are we making to ensure that the next generation has all the tools they need to move on to the next chapter of their lives?”

Mutombo got here to Washington in 1987 with hopes of becoming a health care provider at Georgetown University. Under the tutelage of legendary Georgetown coach John Thompson, Mutombo developed surgical shot-blocking skills in college and during 19 seasons within the NBA. The eight-time NBA All-Star ranks second in NBA history in blocked shots (3,289), behind only African American Hakeem Olajuwon. The four-time NBA Defensive Player of the Year also retired his No. 55 jersey with the Denver Nuggets and Atlanta Hawks.

Nuggets fans will always remember the sight of Mutombo, eyes closed and smiling, holding the ball above his head while lying flat on the ground after upsetting the top-seeded Seattle SuperSonics in the primary round of the 1994 NBA playoffs. NBA fans will always remember Mutombo’s iconic finger wagging as he blocked shot after shot. Young NBA fans could also be best conversant in Mutombo blocking all the pieces on this hilarious GEICO business.

For NBA commissioner Adam Silver, Mutombo was also about more than basketball.

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“Dikembe Mutombo was simply larger than life,” Silver said in a press release. “On the court, he was one of the very best shot-blockers and defenders in NBA history. From the ground, he put his heart and soul into helping others.

For example, Mutombo was also twice a recipient of the NBA Citizenship Award. J. Walter Kennedy for “exceptional service and commitment to the community.” And if there was one person Mutombo loved and is credited with opening doors to assist Africa and the world, it was the late NBA commissioner David Stern. Stern’s assistance, ideas and resources have been instrumental in Mutombo’s humanitarian and basketball efforts in Africa.

NBA Commissioner David Stern (left) shakes hands with Dikembe Mutombo (right), who was chosen 4th overall by the Denver Nuggets in the course of the 1991 NBA Draft on June 26, 1991 in New York .

Nathaniel S. Butler/NBAE via Getty Images

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After the Nuggets chosen Mutombo fourth overall within the 1991 NBA draft, Stern pulled him aside and said he wanted them to make a journey to Africa together. It wasn’t long before the 2 built a father-son relationship. Mutombo, Stern and other NBA players met with the late anti-apartheid activist Nelson Mandela in Johannesburg in 1993 as part of a tour of Africa. Stern has at all times had a global vision for the NBA and chosen Mutombo because the league’s first global ambassador in 2009.

In 2022, Mutombo told me the story of how Stern helped him in a shocking way after his father died within the DRC. Mutombo said his family desired to hold his father’s funeral within the DRC, however it was difficult because there was an ongoing civil war. Mutombo was told it was unsafe for him to attend such an event at the moment. But Mutombo said Stern was astonishingly in a position to use his deep African and global connections to broker a ceasefire for a couple of hours to permit the funeral to happen and allow his brother to take a personal boat there. Mutombo adamantly stated several times that it was a real story.

“I believed Stern then because he had the ability and knowledge to make things happen,” Mutombo said of Stern in an interview with Andscape in 2022. “He was a really smart man who desired to rule the continent. I’m very happy that our commissioner Adam Silver and deputy commissioner Mark Tatum are (following) thoroughly (in Stern’s footsteps). They are committed to David’s promise that the continent will shine.”

In 1996, Mutombo covered the expenses of the Congolese women’s basketball team’s trip to the Atlanta Olympics and bought their uniforms. In 1997, he founded the Dikembe Mutombo Foundation, “whose mission is to improve the health, education and quality of life of the people of Congo.” In 2009, Mutombo opened a $29 million hospital near Congo’s capital, Kinshasa, where 7.5 million people live in poverty and more than 1 million already receive care. The hospital, named after Mutombo’s mother, has treated more than 200,000 patients, in line with Georgetown.

Mutombo has promoted basketball world wide through the Basketball Without Borders program, which incorporates camps in Africa, participated within the NBA Africa Game in 2015, and was present at the sport in 2017. In 2020, the Dikembe Mutombo Foundation began construction of an elementary school within the DRC and through Mutombo Kawa, sourced beans from African coffee plantations, which through the Women in Coffee Initiative heralded opportunities for girls in need.

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“My dad is my hero because he simply cared. “I remain the purest heart I have ever known” – Mutombo’s son, Ryan, he said on Instagram. “Sometimes I thought of my dad as superhuman. The child in me would sigh to hear that something like this never happened. My dad was an ordinary man who wouldn’t go far back to honor the world, its people, and its creator. He loved others with every fiber of his being. That’s what made him so approachable. That’s what made it real.”

Dikembe Mutombo catches a rebound during Game 5 of the 1994 Western Conference Semifinals against the Utah Jazz on May 17, 1994, on the Delta Center in Salt Lake City.

Andrew D. Bernstein/NBAE via Getty Images

Mutombo is the largest reason BAL exists today.

Mutombo was very emotional in the course of the 2017 NBA All-Star Weekend in Charlotte when Silver announced the arrival of BAL. Mutombo told Andscape that he was the primary one to get Silver to create BAL. BAL will begin its fourth season in 2025 under the leadership of its president and Mutombo’s close friend, Amadou Falla. Before Mutombo fell sick, he usually attended BAL matches and even danced enthusiastically with the Senegalese team and fans after the 2022 match.

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BAL is already paying dividends, as this yr the Raptors drafted center Ulrich Chomche from Cameroon, the Jazz acquired rookie Babacar Sane from Senegal on an Exhibit 10 contract, and the announced Duke University men’s basketball program signed center Khaman Maluach from South Sudan.

“We did it because players like Dikembe pointed out the opportunities that exist not only in basketball but in the sports industry across the continent,” Silver told Andscape in 2017. “He and I have been there together at least four times since I was commissioner. And thanks to conversations with FIBA ​​and local sports ministers, we realize that there is a huge opportunity to further develop this discipline (in Africa).”

In 2017, Mutombo told Andscape: “We were trying to find a way to grow the game on the continent. Now the commissioner has made it happen for the league. No more walking around and playing the (exhibition) game. This is great.”

Olajuwon is undoubtedly the very best basketball player to ever come from Africa. Philadelphia 76ers center Joel Embiid and Milwaukee Bucks forward Giannis Antetokounmpo are two African NBA stars hot on Olajuwon’s heels. Toronto Raptors president Masai Ujiri and Fall will proceed to open doors for more Africans to learn the sport and find their way into the NBA.

But relating to being the godfather of African basketball, there isn’t any doubt who the large is: Dikembe Mutombo Mpolondo Mukamba Jean-Jacques Wamutombo.

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“I’m sorry. It’s hard,” Ujiri he said, fighting back tears Monday at Raptors Media Day. “But I actually have to say this guy made us who we’re. This guy is a big. An amazing person. Who are we without Dikembe Mutombo? Impossible. It really is not. I went with him to his hometown of Dikembe Mutombo. I went to his hospital. You do not know how much this guy means to the world.

Embiid said Monday at Sixers Media Day: “It’s a sad day, especially for us Africans and really for the whole world, because beyond what he achieved on the basketball court, I think he was even better off the court.”

Marc J. Spears is Andscape’s senior NBA author. He used to give you the chance to dunk on you, but he hasn’t been in a position to do it for years and his knees still hurt.

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Jalen Milroe can follow the Jalen path in NFL

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Star Black playmakers aren’t any longer an exception – they’re the rule. Throughout the entire football season, this series will discover the importance and influence of black QB from bottom -up to NFL.


Indianapolis-keep me, should you heard it earlier: playmaker Alabama born in Texas, who’s a stronger runner than a passerby, will probably be called outside the first round of the NFL Draft.

The playmaker was undefeated in Sec as a primary -year starter.

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The playmaker never played for the same offensive coordinator.

The name of the playmaker is even Jalen.

But it isn’t clear that Jalen hurts. This winter he was busy winning the Super Bowl MVP, and he didn’t play Iron Bowl or against Michigan.

Instead, it’s a former playmaker of Crimson Tide Jalen Milroewho last week Combine Combine tried to convey the case to the trainers and evaluators that he – like his namesake – is price being their playmaker franchise in the future despite questions on his ability.

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“I went through adversity. I saw everything as a quarterback, “Milroe said on Friday. “I played at the most difficult conference in the country. It would be easier to play at other conferences, but what I could see in Sec catapulted me that I was ready to play NFL. “

Alabama, Jalen Milroe, talks to the media during the NFL mix at the Lucas Oil stadium on February 28 at Indianapolis.

Justin Casterline/Getty Images

Departing from Katy in Texas, she originally got involved in Texas in 2019, but a 12 months later she fell to Alabama. After he was sitting behind the Crimson Tide Starter Bryung for 2 seasons, Milroe took his reins in the 2023 season. He helped Alabama survive Sec (8-0) this 12 months, won by the conference rival and two-time defender Georgia in the SEC championship, which caused Crimson Tide to the play-off collection.

But while Milroe had a big arm (his 10 yards for the test took third place in Sec in 2023), the pass was not his strong suit. For two seasons as a starter Milroe never achieved 3000 yards in one season, the first starter of Alabama, who did it because it … hurts.

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Hurts, from Houston, led Crimson Tide to the National National Championships in 2016–17, but during these two seasons were lower than 5,000 yards. While Hurts was a singular Rusher (1,809 yards and 21 sticks) at the moment, his weakness as a passerby is known for led to the spare Tua Tavailoa during the break of the national championships in 2017.

In the mix, Milroe decided that despite his pedestrian passes, he was still worthy of being a start at NFL.

He is aware of his weaknesses and swore that he worked in the ass to enhance outside being “one dimension.” He could move when his legendary trainer, Nick Saban, retired after the 2023 season, but decided to not fall off. He traveled six miles a day to ensure that that something was left in the fourth quarter in the fourth quarter. He studied progression and reads after I-SNAP to lift his IQ in football.

Unlike the forecast sorts of the first round, Cam Ward and Shedeur Sanders, Milroe threw a mix on Saturday, hoping that he would show the bands that he has mechanics to do that to the playmaker NFL. It turned out to be a mixed bag. Milroe showed strong arm strength and a very good location of sail routes, curls and it while throwing exercises, but fought accuracy on intermediate and on the routes.

“That’s so many things that I can learn more where I am today and where I will be when it comes to day 1, starting with NFL,” said Milroe before Saturday exercises. “Always be a game student, at all times attempt to develop, because it would be so many opportunities in which I can look back and say that it was the moment after I grew up as a playmaker.

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“That’s right now, I’m just trying to grow as much as possible, put my best foot forward and just look for development.”

Jalen Milroe warms up during seniors training at the Hancock Whitney stadium on January 29 at Mobile, Alabama.

Derick E. Hingle/Getty Images

Milroe was asked that he was one other playmaker in Alabama to succeed in the mix, following in the footsteps of the role (who moved to Oklahoma in 2019), Tavailoa, Mac Jones and Bryce Young. Milroe said he appreciates being in the company of others, but he added that it’s difficult to check him with others.

“We had different bands, we had different players around us, we had a different system,” he said.

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But when he specifically asked what he could study the journey of Hurts-from the first manager of the game after the super Bowl-Milroe master said he inspired him his companion Alabam.

“The most important thing I learned from J. Hurts is how he kept his head (I) always continued to work,” said Milroe. “He at all times raised his game, he has never been self -deserved, and all the pieces you see is great progress from him.

“And I have to applaud him as a person, he as a man, because he is definitely inspiring for many playmakers of my image, as well as many playmakers throughout the country. He leads to all of us. “

The couple isn’t completely similar. Hurts had about 20 kilos on Milroe when he was in college. Milroe has a stronger arm, while Hurts played more and not using a mistake of football: Milroe threw 17 interceptions and ate 67 bags for 2 seasons as a starter in comparison with 10 captures Hurts and 43 bags.

But they can each be changing the game when their teams need them. In a highly publicized match against Georgia at the starting of the last season, Milroe finished almost 82% of his passes on 374 yards and two appointments, adding 117 yards to the ground for the next two results.

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Milroe can also match the wounds in the so -called “Jalen-ISMS. “

“Climbing upstairs is not easy, but when you reach the top of this mountain, you will learn so many things when it comes to adversity when it comes to difficulties, things along the way,” said Milroe in a mix.

Martenzie Johnson is an older author for Andcape. His favorite film moment is that Django said: “You all want to see something?”

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Like Tommie Smith and John Carlos from 1968. Black Power Salute inspired me to find my goal

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I’d say that I grew up within the household to be sure that that me and my siblings were aware of the black history. My parents invested in the gathering of black encyclopedias. On the duvet we had a version of the Bible with Black Jesus. Our house was stuffed with books of black novelists and thinkers, and if a black document appeared, we watched it. I watched all movies made on television about Dr. King, each “Roots” and “Alex Haley’s Queen” and I sat for all 14 hours “Eyes on the reward”-as a toddler. Bless my heart.

Having said this, there have been pockets of black history, and more likely that I had no opportunity to delve into once I was a toddler. The college was where all the will for information and understanding of the combined. I attended Morehouse College in Atlanta, Ga., One of a very powerful historically black universities within the country. It was there that I met people from around the globe whose knowledge about black history differed (often depending on the colleges and the communities by which we lived), but everyone had hunger to learn more.

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One day, through the first yr, I remember one among my friends in a T -shirt by which I had definitely seen before, but I never paid attention to. There was a black and white screen printing on the shirt (what I do know now) the enduring moment on the Olympic Games in Mexico in 1968, where on the rostrum for 200-meter medals, Tommie Smith, John Carlos (races 1. And 3. Place Finaners) Everyone gathered a black fist in gloves while he played “Star Spangled Banner”. Peter Norman, the second place from Australia, wore a human rights badge, like Smith and Carlos.

Not only did they raise the fist of black power (although they each said it was for human rights), they received medals in black socks to represent poverty within the black community, and Smith wore a black scarf for black pride. Carlos showed solidarity with blue-wheeled employees, unpacking the jacket and wore a necklace from the beads for individuals who were lynched. Due to the state of Black America in 1968 and a continuing struggle for equality and civil rights, there have been calls to a boycott of the Games. Martin Luther King, Jr. He was also killed in April this yr – and all three athletes were inspired enough to find a way to do it on the rostrum, which led to one of the crucial durable images of public protest.

I remember how I learned history and realized that on the most important scene these brave men used their moment of triumph and victory to quietly protest against the conditions of underrated communities in America. I felt strengthened; We often discuss standing on the arms of giants, however the more I got into the history of black in America, the more I spotted what number of giants there have been. In college I used to be very bad and for a while ready to burn every part that represented the establishment or any obstacle to black liberation. I felt like all those individuals who even saw their space on the planet in reference to individuals who could never give you the option to speak as heroes whose lives were to be modeled later. Especially since it was also fastidiously that putting people in front of him can often bring an enormous personal loss.

When Smith and Carlos took their position, they were booed on the stadium and ordered to be sent home by the International Olympic Committee. The athletes returned home, but they weren’t welcomed by the hero, but as a substitute of rough sleds, and even in some cases the specter of death. They were also not beloved by athletes. Two men, associated eternally in history, even have a good relationship –Carlos even claims that he let Smith go within the race Because “Tommie Smith would never put his fist in the sky if I won this race,” the claim that Smith denies.

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History ultimately has a way of rights, but it surely took a few years and realizations on the front of social policy, in order that the actions of those persons are perceived as brave and needed, not only selfish and smug.

The lessons that I learned from College and continuous reading and education I gained (my head remained within the book about black history) were one among the best advantages in HBCU. The very variety of books I learned about about which I actually have never heard of – I actually have upheld me all my life.

That is why I remember sooner or later I used to be walking around Washington, the eastern Washington market and a street seller was selling different photos of moments in black history, and he had a 40 -inch photo within the Tommie Smith and John Carlos frame. I paid for it in money and spent it across the capital of the country until I returned home. I do know that it happened in 2005 (I finished Morehouse College in 2001) because I just moved to my first apartment with no roommate and it was the very first thing that I actually have ever suspended on the wall. This picture within the frame still hangs on the wall in my home in 2025 and I used it to teach my children about sacrifice and privilege and how you may have to discuss individuals who cannot.

Teenage students of Stax Music Academy Mark 25th anniversary, black history month with a concert

The query that my youngest children often ask: “How do I know who can’t speak for herself?” Which is an incredible query. For this I answered an easy fact, pointing to the photo:

“These men have made a gesture that gave people whose most of us, including them, would never see or never know them, but on which life negatively affects the alternatives of the wealthy and the federal government. Sometimes you may have to take this chance to say something because you do not know in the event you’ll ever have such a big platform.

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Son, there may be at all times someone who cannot speak for himself, and you may have to use it in a voice, because perhaps the thing you say or a stand that can help someone you understand, live a greater life. ”

I take advantage of words that may understand a little bit higher, but I can inform you that my children have a look at this photo on a regular basis, and once one among my sons said: “These guys are heroes, right?”

I say yes, they’re. They are the heroes of the Black History.

They will live eternally for speaking, and even quietly, in solidarity with those that couldn’t.

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Panama Jackson Thegrio.com

(Tagstranslate) @Ap

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Main Treasury Official Morgan State University, Sterling Steward, died

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Morgan State University, Sterling Steward


Morgan State University announced that his older associate athletics director and tax director, Sterling Steward, died.

No reason for death was disclosed, but the college has confirmed his contribution since he was employed in December 2022.

Steward died on February 26. In Morgan State he was accountable for the event of university programs, supporting partnerships and strengthening the financial and operational success of the Faculty.

“Sterling was more than a colleague-he was a respected leader, mentor and friend,” said in a written statement by Den Freeman-Patton, vice chairman and director of inter-university athletes. “His passion for athletics and commitment to raising Morgan programs were visible in everything he did. He worked tirelessly to ensure that our sports students had resources and the possibilities of distinction, and its impact will be felt for many years. We expand our deepest condolences to his family and loved ones, especially his three sons and sister when we mourn this huge loss. “

While the steward worked in Morgan, strategic growth and cooperation occurred. His work with the institutional development department helped to offer more opportunities and created lasting relationships to support sports programs.

Steward earlier he worked At the University of New Orleans (UNO) as an assistant to the college athletics director for strategic income generation. He also made stays on the University of Alaska Fairbanks, Savannah State University, Mississippi Valley State University, Alabama State University, Kentucky State University, Eastern Oregon University and Xavier University in various roles, including for a senior consultant athletics director and sports director.

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He was from New Orleans, who received the title of bachelor and master’s degree on the University of Southern Mississippi. He won a bachelor’s degree in the sphere of coaching and administration/history of sport and his master’s degree in the sphere of sport management.

(Tagstransate) Morgan State Universiry

This article was originally published on : www.blackenterprise.com
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