NBA players don’t have a monopoly on great stories. The referees also have courses that are out of the ordinary. That of Intae Hwang, to whom The Associated Press devotes a paper, is one. When he was younger, this native of South Korea wanted to play basketball. But his parents, although sporty, did not allow him. He still reached the NBA years later with another jersey on his back: that of a referee.
” The NBA was simply my dream. I watched it on TV, that’s all. I never, ever tried to get into the NBA on my own. In fact, it was rather the big league that went for it. He has now been a referee for almost twenty years and stood out on the biggest international stage, at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics.
This is where the NBA started to take an interest in him. This interest resulted in an invitation to come to Las Vegas for the 2017 Summer League. The league continued to follow his career after his return to South Korea, keeping in touch. So three years ago, before the Covid crisis, Intae Hwang took the plunge by moving his family to the United States to touch his NBA dream.
And this, despite the family complications that this could cause. ” I worried about my family, my wife, my son and my daughter. My wife made a lot of sacrifices, because she didn’t speak English at all. Now she can say ‘thank you, hello’, that sort of thing. »
Even if he is not yet among the full-time referees, he is getting closer, match after match. Affiliated with the G-League, the referee has officiated several pre-season games and is expected to be called up during the regular season.
” Intae has shown an enormous ability to learn and apply quickly. He had a dream, that of joining our program. He participated in our referee development program, which we used as a way for him to learn the language and the culture. He entered our industry on merit, without any promises Finally, notes Monty McCutchen, the league’s director of referee training.
