The ‘US College’-route and its effect on Belgian Basketball.

A Deeper Look into the Past, Present and Future:

Imagine it. Every single game you play in and every arena you go to is fully packed to the brim with more than 10.000 enthusiastically chanting fans. The home-fans section is literally sending vibrations throughout the entire arena with their constant jumping up and down as they quite possibly expel more sweat than the actual players on the court. The acrobatic cheerleaders chanting your name with every good play you make. The marching band that adds that particular extra touch to the general amazing atmosphere and excitement that fills the air. The full support you get, not just at the games but everywhere you go, and not just from a couple of die-hard fans, but from a community and even a whole city with a culture and economy that is entirely build around the local sports teams…

It’s an experience that I think we can all agree on is a very enticing prospect, especially for our own youngsters with aspirations of becoming professional basketball players.

Unfortunately, it’s not an experience they can attain in any Belgian or even European club, or at least not on the same scale as they could in the USA. Besides the huge differences in financial means and available facilities, the Belgian (and by extension European) clubs just don’t have that same sports-based culture surrounding them and lifting them up, and let’s face it… basketball in particular simply isn’t popular enough, especially in Belgium.

So, since reaching the NBA remains a very difficult challenge and not given to many, going to the NCAA is in most cases the only alternative for our youngsters to get at least a taste of that experience in the many US Collegiate Leagues. And, let’s not forget that it still remains the ‘easiest’ way to get a foot in the door towards the always looming NBA dream. It’s therefore no wonder that more and more of our youngsters are deciding to leave Europe behind and take the ‘US College’-route to try to find their way through the US collegiate levels and reach the NCAA 1st Division and from there on launch a professional basketball career, whether that be in Belgium or Europe.

The Past.

Although that vision of the “American Dream” must’ve existed throughout the past decades, it has taken us homely Belgians quite a while before we really started to be open to the possibility.

From the first brave adventurers in the 1980’s such as Ivan Verberckt, Dimitri Lambrecht and Tom Schellemans who tried their luck in the States and found their way on NCAA D1 schools and went on to have professional careers in Belgium after their graduation. To the late 1990’s and the 2000’s in which more and more youngsters were finding their way to the States and into NCAA D1, D2 or D3 schools with as notable names Gerben Van Dorpe, Sebastien Bellin, the Tshomba Dynasty with the 3 brothers Butch, Douglas and Duke, the Wim and Tom Van De Keere twins, Wen Mukubu, Randy Oveneke and at least 20 others.

Since 2010 the amount of Belgian youngsters in the USA has continued to increase and that trend isn’t about to change anytime soon, quite the contrary.

And why would it?

As far as becoming a professional basketball player after college, the NCAA and our Belgian Youngsters have a pretty decent success rate of 56.5%… at least according to my own research.

You see, I’ve recently been labelled somewhat of a statgeek and so I decided I might as well start throwing some statistics around and thus live up to my new nickname of “spreadsheet Sven”.

Although I’m still sligthly shaken by my new moniker, I’ve gone to work anyway and have collected the names of all Belgian youngsters who have played college basketball in NCAA D1, NCAA D2 and/or NCAA D3 since 1979 up to the current season. For my own ease, I’ve decided to leave out all youngsters who’ve played at the lower collegiate levels such as NAIA, NJCAA, HS and/or Prep schools, reducing my list to 90 players in total.

Out of those 90 youngsters, 69 have graduated or left their schools by now and 39 of them (or the aforementioned 56.5%) have gone on to play professional basketball during a minimum of 2 seasons. A total of 42 youngsters out of the 69 (60.9%) returned to Belgium and either played semi-professional or professional basketball in one of the Belgian national leagues, while 18 youngsters (26.1%) launched their careers in other European leagues and for the most part remained abroad during their prime, before (in some cases) returning to Belgium later on in their careers. From 9 youngsters (13%) I have not been able to find any info on their careers after graduation and so presumably they have quit playing basketball or only played at a provincial level.

Based on the above numbers you could conclude that having our youngsters going off to the NCAA is ultimately a good thing for Belgian Basketball: our youngsters can get a level of individual development there that our clubs simply can’t offer, and when the majority of these youngsters return to Belgium as pro-ready and mature players who can immediately have an impact on the court and at the same time offer the fans a familiar face to cheer on and root for, the ‘US College’-route sounds like a pretty good deal for both sides.

Unfortunately, that trend seems to be rapidly changing.

The Present.

For the past 2 seasons the amount of youngsters choosing the ‘US College’-route and finding their way on a NCAA school has gone from an average of 3 to 4 youngsters each season in the early 2010’s and the 2020s to an increase to 7 in 2024 and a new record of 9 youngsters this season with Ayuba Bryant, Corentin Efono, Eric Dibami Tomou, Jarne Elouna Eyenga, Jo Van Buggenhout, Noah Meeusen, Oskar Giltay, Thijs De Ridder, Xander Pintelon, and possibly a 10th player in Sean Pouedet who will all get their first NCAA experience this upcoming season. Out of these 10 youngsters, 6 were already playing in the BNXT League last season with 5 of them receiving relevant minutes in their respective clubs.

It’s undoubtedly an understandable decision by the youngsters in question, but probably a less positive trend for the clubs and basketball in Belgium in general. This season, a total of 21 talented Belgian youngsters will be playing in the NCAA. That’s 21 players who could otherwise have been counted upon to start taking their places in their respective clubs’ rotations and who had to be replaced somehow, preferably without losing on overall quality.

If these players do indeed return to the BNXT League once they’ve graduated, then it will simply be a matter of weathering out the storm for a couple of seasons in which the importance and level of our Belgian players in the league will likely drop, until the influx of the returning homegrown NCAA-schooled players starts to give the league some renewed energy.

But, as I already eluded to earlier on, that trend is drastically changing and from the 21 Belgian youngsters who have graduated from college since 2020, only 10 have returned to play basketball in Belgium (47.6%). Out of those 10 returnees only 7 of them signed as pro players in the Belgian First Division and only 3 of them are currently still in the BNXT League with Sam Hofman (2nd year), Noel Coleman & Aubin Gateretse (both 1st year). So in short, from a return-rate to Belgium of 66.7% from 1980 up to 2019 (32 out of the 48 who graduated in that period), the return-rate has dropped to 47.6% in the last 5 years (10 out of 21 graduates). Out of the 21 graduates in the 2020’s, 14 (66.7%) have gone on to play several seasons as a pro, which is a solid increase from the 25 out of 48 graduates (52.1%) between 1980 and 2020.

The Future.

With the flood gates now fully open, I see no reason why the number of youngsters who take the ‘US College’-route won’t continue to increase over the coming years, while at the same time it is fair to also expect the return-rate of these youngsters to continue to decrease as well. Although, hopefully at a much slower rate.

The new NCAA rules, along with the NIL rules – which simply put both allow college players to earn a lot of money – have added yet another layer to the already immense appeal of US colleges as our youngsters can now earn more money in one college season than they would otherwise earn in 5 or more seasons as a young pro in Belgium.

Obviously, the BNXT League is unable to compete with those financial capabilities and so the future of the BNXT clubs regarding their talented youngsters has become a huge question mark as we’ll have to wait and see how the current trends evolve and what the ultimate effect will be on Belgian Basketball in general and the BNXT League in particular.

Personally, if the trends I’ve discussed continue at the same rate over the coming seasons then I can only conclude that this will have a serious negative impact on the BNXT clubs who invest as much money as they’re able to into the development of their youngsters, only to then see the best of them moving off to college, often to never return, leaving their respective clubs with no return on their investment of several years and at the same time forcing them to find a suitable replacement for a projected future D1 player. All this could eventually lead to clubs starting to neglect their youth development, ultimately resulting in a further decline of the overall level of Belgian basketball and the BNXT League in particular.

So, what can the federation and the BNXT clubs do to prevent this worst-case scenario? I’m afraid I don’t have any real answers to offer on that end. A possible and easily acomplished first step could be for the clubs to sign projected D1 players earlier on in their development with a long-running professional contract and a buy-out clause in their contracts in case NCAA colleges come knocking. That way, the clubs at least get partly compensated for their financial investments in their youth development and depending on the size of the buy-out it could actually be a real financial boost for the club which they can then reinvest in either their first team or put right back into their youth development.

As far as being able to convince our talented youngsters to opt to remain in Belgium rather than taking the ‘US College’-route, I’m afraid that is an already lost cause. Unless the current political climate in the USA continues to deteriorate and the government suddenly decides to clamp down on the amount of foreigners that are allowed to get fully-paid scholarships from US colleges, I expect our Belgian youngsters to continue their exodus across the ocean to chase their American Dream.

I certainly can’t fault them for that. If I happened to have the same skillset, mental fortitude and aspirations of becoming a pro basketball player I would do exactly the same thing, and therefore I have no clue how the league and clubs could possibly convince our youngsters to stay in Belgium instead of taking their chances and large amounts of money in the States.

All I do know is that the new rules will have a profound and clearly noticeable effect on the Belgian and European basketball scenes. For better or for worse… and all I can do is hope that smarter people than me can put their heads together and come up with ways to prevent a significant overall decline of Belgian Basketball.

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Here is the full overview of the Belgian Youngsters who have played basketball in the NCAA1, NCAA2 and/or NCAA3 and their first pro team after graduation/leaving their schools, according to my own research on the past 46 years of Belgian Basketball (1979-2025). I did my best to collect all the names and info and I do apologize if there are any players missing or if I have made any mistakes otherwise.

(The images open full scale in a new tab when you click/tap on them):

Players in Green returned to Belgium after college.

Players in Red have started professional careers Abroad (many of them did return to Belgium later on in their careers).

Players in Yellow are currently still in college.

For the players in white I haven’t been able to find any more info on their basketball careers after college.