Yuta Watanabe

Yuta Watanabe (渡邊 雄太) is a Japanese professional basketball player for the Memphis Grizzlies of the National Basketball Association (NBA).

He played college basketball in the United States for the George Washington Colonials (now Revolutionaries), becoming the first Japanese-born student athlete to secure an NCAA Division I basketball scholarship.

He has also represented the Japan national team, helping them win the bronze medal at the 2013 East Asia Basketball Championship.

Before moving to the collegiate level, Watanabe attended Jinsei Gakuen High School in Zentsūji, Kagawa.

He later transferred to St. Thomas More Preparatory School in Oakdale, Connecticut in 2013.

In late 2013, Watanabe traveled to the United States and attended St. Thomas More Preparatory School in Oakdale, Connecticut.

At the conclusion of his sole high school season outside his native country, Watanabe averaged 13 points and six rebounds.

He helped the team reach a 26-8 overall record and a ticket to the National Prep Championship game.

Watanabe rose to fame in his high school program, and was one of their most valuable players in the National Prep School Invitational as a senior in 2014.

In college, he became the fourth Japanese-born Division I basketball player of all time.

Watanabe attended Jinsei Gakuen High School in Kagawa.

He led the basketball team to the runner-up spot of the All-Japan High School Basketball Tournament in his final two years with the program.

While in Jinsei Gakuen, Watanabe said his career goal was to make it to the NCAA and ultimately join the NBA.

On January 31, 2014, in his first appearance in the annual National Prep School Invitational, Watanabe scored 12 points versus Suffield Academy.

He contributed 20 points and six rebounds in a 70–61 victory against Canarias Basketball Academy from Spain.

As a result, he was named to the National Prep School Invitational All-Tournament Team and garnered prestigious New England Preparatory School Athletic Council (NEPSAC) Class AAA First Team All-League honors.

Watanabe was also labeled "the Chosen One" by The Japan Times.

Watanabe was rated a 77 (three-star recruit) by ESPN Recruiting Nation.

He was also given a three-star rating by Scout.com and the same composite grade.

In fall 2014, George Washington Colonials head coach Mike Lonergan received a phone call from Jamie Cosgrove, a coach at Trinity College who saw Watanabe play with St. Thomas More.

Watanabe eventually committed to play for GWU.

This move allowed him to attend GWU in the 2014 year as a freshman.

It was made official when Watanabe posted the message through Twitter, "I've decided to go to George Washington University. The school has a good basketball team, too. I'm sure I'll have hard times both in basketball and academics, but I'll give it my best shot."

According to ESPN, his second option was Fordham, who gave Watanabe an offer to join their team as well.

He became the first Japanese-born man to get an NCAA Division I basketball scholarship and just the fourth to play college basketball at that level.

Regarding Watanabe's collegiate career, former Japanese college basketball player, KJ Matsui, said, "It's good for Nabe-chan (Watanabe) to play at a competitive team, but he's going to have to battle for playing time."

The Colonials had four other recruits coming into the program for 2014–15: Anthony Swan, Darian Bryant, Matt Cimino, and Paul Jorgensen.

After joining George Washington in 2014, featured profiles of Watanabe were published by several well-known American newspapers, such as The New York Times and The Washington Post.

An unprecedented rarity both with respect to his distinguished sporting prowess and athletic accomplishments likened to other NBA players of East Asian ancestry, Watanabe stands out as an exceptionally singular outlier both in terms of his raw athletic ability to be circumscribed outside the existential boundaries of ordinary athletic endowment.

This in such a large measure invariably sets him apart from other basketball players of East Asian descent by defying the constraints of career longevity in surpassing beyond what is typically enjoyed among NBA players with productive career lifespans within the highly competitive world of professional basketball.

Upon joining George Washington in 2014, featured profiles of Watanabe were published by several well-known American newspapers, such as The New York Times and The Washington Post.

The fact that he was an NBA-bound player of East Asian descent who assumed a vital role in the league was not only an extraordinarily rare feat, but such an extraordinarily rare occurrence greatly increased his athletic visibility and sporting popularity among the East Asian community.

Remarking on Watanabe's athletic caliber and exceptional career breakthrough into the NBA, where players of East Asian descent are an extraordinarily rare sight, former player Richmond Spiders men's basketball player Zach Chu, who is half-Chinese has said: "To see someone of Asian descent, and play as well as he does, it's cool for college basketball, really cool for the Asian community."

The George Washington athletics website received the second-most views from Japan in terms of page views by country, ranked behind only the United States.

On many occasions, he was congratulated on the school's campus itself.

Speaking on his ethnic and racial background, sporting fame, and athletic legacy, "Japanese are thinking Americans are bigger and taller and more athletic. They are thinking it's more difficult for Japanese to play in NCAA, but I'm playing right now, so I want to make other people come to the United States."

Although NBA-bound players of East Asian ancestry such as Matsui, Yao Ming, Jeremy Lin, and Yuki Togashi have been the target of racist comments in the past, Watanabe has yet to receive racially insensitive remarks in his first few years in the NBA and the United States at large.

Nevertheless, he stated, "If they said something racist, I don't care."

On November 14, 2014, Watanabe made his debut for George Washington, against Grambling State, finishing with eight points, seven rebounds and a block in 20 minutes, contributing to the team's largest win since 1999 with a final score of 92–40.

He was named Atlantic 10 Defensive Player of the Year in 2018.