The New York Times Profiles PAA

I can't get enough of stories like this:

“I owe everything to basketball,” Aboya said recently in his native French. “Without basketball, I wouldn’t be here. I probably wouldn’t even have gone to college. And it’s thanksto basketball that I can live out my dreams.”

It began with an envelope that landed on Willard’s desk at Tilton six years ago. At the time the prep school was looking to expand its international student population and was developing an English as a Second Language program. Tilton had never had a student from Africa. Suddenly, here was a file from a student who spoke a couple of languages, none of them English, and who excelled in two sports, one of them basketball.

And there was the photograph to prove it. So Willard took a chance.

Though Aboya had already graduated from high school in Cameroon, he saw a path to an American university education. If it meant two years of prep school first, it was a sacrifice worth making. What Willard got was a tremendous athlete who pushed himself as hard in the classroom as he did on the court. But as quickly as he picked up English, some of the finer points of basketball strategy required more time.

“He was very, very raw,” said Willard, who is now the director of basketball at the University of Wyoming. “So his first year, we made it a rule that he had to stick to the paint.”

By his senior year, Aboya had become a dominant center, attracting attention from colleges like Georgetown and U.C.L.A. And it was on his visit to the West Coast, nine time zones from home, that Aboya made friends with Luc Richard Mbah a Moute, who grew up minutes away from him in Yaoundé.

And here is a glimpse of how PAA worked to get his degree and emerge as one of the legendary Ben Ball warriors of all time:

As soon as possible, he sat down with his academic adviser to build a schedule to graduate in three years. It was a schedule of study, practice, study, rinse and repeat. It was a work ethic that made him an instant leader in Howland’s eyes. “People asked me if I drank coffee all the time or did other stuff,” Aboya said. “But I told them that when you’re mentally prepared to accomplish something, it’s easier to get through it.”

If his team-mates can match him in his determination and tenacity this tourney season, UCLA will be just fine.

I never thought I would become more attached to another player than AA. But PAA is proving me wrong. One of my favorite Bruins ... ever.

GO BRUINS.