What’s it like playing pro hoops overseas? Allow ex-WVU star Nate Adrian to fill you in

Back in February of 2019, I was hosting a live sports fireside chat at a local restaurant in Wheeling for Wheelhouse Creative. WVU basketball favorite Nate Adrian was the guest.

It seemed like he’d given up the idea of playing professionally and I asked why.

“Too fat,” he deadpanned.

Well, that’s certainly not the case these days. After leading WVU to two Sweet Sixteen appearances in his college career, Adrian has played two years professionally overseas. He was first in France, where he was named All-French NM1 second team, and then, until a few days ago, he was in the Ukraine, where he averaged 17.9 points and 7.9 rebounds for Mykolaiv.

So, what happened to being “too fat”?

“I was,” Adrian laughed. “Then I began playing in the [The Basketball Tournament] and realized it’s a lot more fun than working. I figured I’d give it another chance – and it’s working out so far. I’m enjoying it.”

Yet I – and I’m sure many Mountaineer fans – would like to know this: What exactly is it like to play pro ball overseas?

Let’s start from scratch. Mykolaiv is a port city in southern Ukraine on the Black Sea. It has a population of 480,000 and is known for shipbuilding. Sounds nice, right?

“Gray every single day I was there,” Adrian said. “Cold. Got windy. Would have a negative 12 wind chill at times.”

Adrian left Morgantown in mid-October of last year and returned the beginning of May. He said a typical stint is from August until May, a good nine months away from the U.S.

“It’s tough,” Adrian said. “It’s not easy. It’s not for everybody. You’ve got to be in the right mindset to make it through because you’re spending a lot of time by yourself in an apartment.”

His fiancée, Lucky Lucente, stayed in Morgantown to teach at an elementary school. At the time she took the job, Adrian didn’t know his basketball status.

“It’s tough being away,” Adrian said. “I mean, the first year without the Corona virus stuff, my family visited once. My mom came another time. My friends came and saw me. I traveled. I went and saw Alex Ruoff.

“This year there was none of that. It seven months of being by myself.”

The upside?

“It’s pretty easy money – let’s be honest – to just play the games,” he said. “I’m not working too hard.”

We’ll revisit money in a bit. But back to the basics. In Mykolaiv, most residents speak Russian and the rest speak Ukrainian. How did he manage the language barrier?

“You figure it out,” he said. “There’s no getting around it. When you go to the stores, you’re just picking up stuff you recognize. There wasn’t much reading the labels. Around basketball, though, there’s usually at least a few people that speak English, either on the staff or team.”

So why the Ukraine Superleague?

“I have an agent,” Adrian said. “He gets things started for me. Teams reach out to him and then we see where it goes.”

He continued.

“Every country has different leagues. Certain countries have better leagues than others. Because I took two years off, I went to the third division in France last year. It’s not a very good league, but because I took that time off, it’s what I had to do.

“A lot of top leagues – the best ones in Europe – didn’t want to take a chance on me because I hadn’t played anywhere. But this year I played in the top league in the Ukraine. The league is respected by other countries, and I played well again. So, I should be good to go for next year. We’ll see.”

Adrian said notable names like Brice Johnson, formerly of North Carolina, and Steve Burtt, formerly of Iona, played this past season in the Ukrainian Superleague.

“There are a lot of good players,” Adrian said. “There are guys who played in the NBA. I’d probably say it compares to a very good mid-majors [college] league. Low-high major teams.”

Oh, and while on the subject of “low,” I asked Nate how good Mykolaiv was this season.

“Not good,” he said. “My team was not good, but we had a lot of coaching situations and turnover. By the end of the year there were 12 different people that had been let go by the team.”

That’s apparently what happens at home or abroad when your team goes 7-33.

“Oh yeah, it’s cutthroat,” he said. “If you’re not playing well, they get rid of you. And they don’t wait until the end of the year.”

But, again, back to basics. And, for Adrian, the good stuff.

“They get everything situated for you before you arrive,” Adrian said. “You don’t have to do anything. You just show up and they have it ready for you. You really don’t have to do anything other than play.”

How are the apartments?

“Typically, housing is nice,” he said. “I was in a good spot in the Ukraine. I wouldn’t call it a good spot, but for their standards it was nice.”

And, yes, I asked about the financial side of the job.

“Once you factor in that you don’t pay taxes, you don’t have or pay for a car, you don’t pay for housing, you have no expenses other than feeding yourself, it works out very well,” Adrian said. “I was still working my way up this year, but next year I should be doing pretty good. Most of my earnings have come home with me.”

As I wrote in a previous blog, Adrian is one of 23 former Mountaineers – not counting Daxter Miles, who was in the NBA G League – still playing professionally.

“There’s a ton if you include transfers and stuff,” Adrian said. “Probably 20 or so. [Joe] Alexander is a huge star. Him and [Kevin Jones] are the big-time guys.”

A fascinating vocation.

“It’s interesting,” Adrian said.

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Mitch Vingle covered sports in West Virginia for 38 years. Follow Mitch on Twitter at @MitchVingle and be sure to check out the rest of Wheelhouse Creative’s website for your marketing and advertising needs. If interested, call us at 304-905-6005.