It's one of the most incredible stories ever written about the links between American basketball and France. Bob Cousy, legendary point guard for the Celtics, nicknamed the “Houdini of the courts”, is not far from being the first Frenchman to have played in the NBA.
Indeed, his father was French, French-speaking and he returned to our country several times. We are therefore a long way from a Dominique Wilkins, whose only link with France is to have been born in Paris.
If Bob Cousy was born in New York, his father was born in Belfort. With his wife, an American who arrived in France at the age of five, they even lived in Dijon… The Cousy couple then settled in the United States and it was there that little Bob was born in 1928.
Until the age of 5 and his entry into school, the future Celtics star practiced and immersed himself in the French language spoken at home. If he learned English, it was as a foreign language or in the street with his friends! Then editor-in-chief of Basket Hebdo, our colleague Pascal Legendre had spoken with the six-time NBA champion.
No American accent in his French
In this interview, Bob Cousy spoke a little French, with remnants dating from discussions with his mother, who died in the 1980s.
“He didn't say more than the sentences transcribed in the interview.”remembers Pascal Legendre. “But it wasn't American French. I felt like it was buried in his brain even though he doesn't use it at all anymore.”
Even though he spent most of his life in the United States, Cousy never forgot this French influence. He returned to France several times, including a strong memory at the age of 37, where he went to his father's village to find the family farm. The 1957 MVP then met his uncles, farmers who grew potatoes and raised goats.
“I think there were three of them, although I could be wrong about that. They were still working on the family farm. I was with my wife and my two daughters who were twelve and thirteen. My God! If my father had not come to the United States, instead of becoming “Mr. Basketball,” I would have been planting potatoes on that farm! (Laughs)”recounted Bob Cousy in issue 115 of Basket Hebdo.
Forgotten memories and names
In the greatest discretion, one of the 76 best players in the history of the NBA came to Alsace in 1966, and several times to France until 1995, the year of his last visit.
Bob Cousy has excellent memories of his travels in France, particularly of meetings with the late Robert Busnel, former coach of the French team and Real Madrid, but also former president of the French Basketball Federation and then of FIBA.
“As I took a few days to call him, he hesitated, and he thought about all his moments in France,” decrypts Pascal Legendre. “Not everything he told me was spontaneous. Nevertheless, it is astonishing to observe his vivid memory and his attachment to his French “journey” after so many years, with figures from French basketball now forgotten.”
These French memories of Bob Cousy, recounted by Basket Hebdo in two issues of 2015, and his story more generally, are precious because they illustrate a bygone era when information and media coverage of the best basketball players in the world were not as outrageous and easy as in the 2010s.
These memories are also there to remind us that Bob Cousy is undoubtedly the first “Frenchman” in the NBA, and at the same time the most successful and most prestigious with six NBA titles, an MVP trophy, and ten selections in the First All-NBA Team!
Article originally published in 2022
