A Mexico City Basketball Team with N.B.A. Dreams Makes a Home in Texas

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In May, the Capitanes poached Nick Lagios from the Lakers organization to make him their typical manager, and by September, a compromise of kinds experienced been reached: The Capitanes would hit the highway for 14 game titles as component of the G League’s Showcase Cup, then engage in a pair of exhibitions in January towards the G League Ignite, the workforce for prime N.B.A. prospective customers.

Lagios and Díaz sought a mix of players as they assembled their roster: players with Latin American roots, players who relished defending, players with knowledge who could mentor younger teammates. The staff wooed gamers with the probability of getting recognized by N.B.A. scouts along with the somewhat fewer alluring present of a prorated G League wage, which is usually $37,000 for a whole 50-recreation period. As well as, the players could be a part of some thing new.

“It’s a staff that cares about winning,” stated Justin Reyes, a previous Division II all-American at St. Thomas Aquinas College in Sparkill, N.Y. “So we all understood we would require to make sacrifices to make it do the job in this sort of a shorter sum of time.”

Serratos recalled the start of coaching camp final month and a moment of collective joy: The Capitanes, following so a lot of delays and so significantly uncertainty, had last but not least arrive collectively. But his serenity was jarred loose, he mentioned, when Tyler Davis, a 6-foot-10 electrical power forward, went up for a dunk in the initially minutes of the team’s 1st follow and shattered the backboard. Díaz rushed around to look at on him.

“Tyler, you are a monster!” Díaz informed him.

Even though Serratos commenced calculating how considerably it would price tag to change the backboard, there was an additional, more immediate problem: His assortment of nomads was quickly down a hoop. No far more dunking.

On the early morning of their video game against the Austin Spurs, the Capitanes were again on the bus — this time, bound for a mild shootaround at the arena and yet another option to form chemistry. The group had been bolstered by a few of late additions, including Moises Andriassi, a 21-yr-outdated level guard and just one of Mexico’s top rated young players.