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Nijal Pearson is still disappointed he didn’t get to finish this year’s Sun Belt tournament.
The No. 3 seed Bobcats were 8-2 over their last 10 games of the 2019-20 season. They’d just advanced to the semifinals after defeating No. 6 seed Appalachian State on March 11, 85-68. They would have met No. 2 seed South Alabama at the Smoothie King Center in New Orleans on March 14. Head coach Danny Kaspar said he “never felt more confident about a team” making the NCAA tournament than he did about this one. Pearson felt the same.
All of the team’s potential energy was never converted to kinetic, though, after the NCAA shut down all spring athletic events. It was like riding a roller coaster that stalls out on its highest hill, then being asked to get off the ride for maintenance.
“It was crazy. I mean, it's a pandemic, you know, so there's not a lot that can be done or things that can be changed,” Pearson said. “It's just something that I wish wouldn't have happened. But you know, you just kind of swallow it down and learn to grow from this situation and just keep moving on, keep going.”
For Texas State’s all-time leading scorer, that meant finding a new roller coaster. The guard announced on Monday he had agreed to terms with Chorale Roanne, a basketball club that plays in France’s top league, LNB Pro A.
“Anyway, you look at it, you know, it's painful to just think back about it and know it went down like that,” Pearson said. “But I like to look at the bright side of things. So I'm just, I'm thankful for the opportunity to be able to play and I'm thankful that I had a pretty good career, a pretty storied career. So it's a downfall and it hurts but I like to look at the bright side of things as well.”
With his college basketball career officially over, Pearson took about three weeks after the season to give his body a rest. He stayed quarantined like everyone else during the pandemic while simultaneously fielding pitches from agents trying to sign him.
He eventually chose Scott Nichols from Rize Management and began to pick up his workouts again. Another three weeks later, the offer from Chorale Roanne came in.
“It was actually my only offer, my first offer,” Pearson said. “We weren't expecting anything until about June, July. But the offer was so good, we couldn't pass it up. The opportunity was so good that we didn't even want to look anywhere else. Everything just worked out.”
Pearson’s competition will be tough. ESPN’s Fran Fraschilla ranked LNB Pro A as the seventh-toughest basketball league outside the NBA in 2017. Almost every active French NBA player came up playing in the league — the one exception being Portland Trail Blazer forward Jaylen Hoard, who played in the second-tier LNB Pro B.
Chorale Roanne was promoted to Pro A after winning the Pro B championship in 2019. The team went 8-17 overall before this season came to an abrupt end, but has had some NBA talent come through its doors, too. Former Cleveland Cavalier Samardo Samuels and former Los Angeles Clipper Brice Johnson were both featured on the roster this year. The club plays with an up-tempo style and runs its offense through its guards — which Pearson obviously likes.
The Beaumont native said he would likely have tested the NBA Draft waters had the league not postponed the event indefinitely on Friday. But he’s not giving up on his dream quite yet, either.
“I'm just not in a position, me personally, to sit around and wait on that process right now,” Pearson said. “So I'm planning on trying the process next year after having a good rookie season in Roanne … So I mean, the NBA is not out of reach for me. It's not like a journey that I've gone away from. It's just that I have to do what's best for me and my family at this point.”
Pearson said he plans to head to Roanne, France, sometime in August. He’ll be the only one from his family to make the trip, but plans to come back to the States and visit often.
He thought he knew a few words in French, but could only recall “bonjour.” He’s excited to learn more.
What he’ll miss most about Texas State is the atmosphere of Strahan Arena — his family and friends being part of a packed crowd that exploded in cheers every time he scored one of his 2,122 career points.
But it’s time to create a new atmosphere, halfway across the world.
“I'm just excited about being a professional basketball player, man,” Pearson said. “At the end of the day, I'm going to give it my all, do my best every game, continue to grow, continue to get better and just be the best basketball player I can be on a night-in-night-out basis.”
