Joel Bolomboy (russian: Джоэл Боломбой, Joel Bolomboy) (born January 28, 1994) is a Ukrainian-born Russian-American professional

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...

player for

Olympiacos Olympiacós Sýndesmos Filáthlon Peiraiós ( el, Ολυμπιακός Σύνδεσμος Φιλάθλων Πειραιώς, Olympic Club of Fans of Piraeus) is a major multi-sport club based in Piraeus, Greece. Olympiacos is parent to a number ...

of the

Greek Basket League The Greek Basket League (GBL), often also referred to as the Greek A1 Basketball League, or Greek Basketball Championship (originally called Panhellenic Basketball Championship), and also known as the Stoiximan Basket League for sponsorship reaso ...

and the EuroLeague. He played

college basketball In United States colleges, top-tier basketball is governed by collegiate athletic bodies including National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), the United States Collegiate Athleti ...

for the

Weber State Wildcats The Weber State Wildcats are the varsity athletic teams representing Weber State University in Ogden, Utah in intercollegiate athletics, sponsoring 16 teams. The Wildcats compete in NCAA Division I FCS and are charter members (1963) of the Big Sk ...

, where he was named Big Sky Conference Player of the Year in 2016. He was born in

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

but received Russian citizenship in 2018.

Early life and college career

Bolomboy was born in

Donetsk Donetsk ( , ; uk, Донецьк, translit=Donets'k ; russian: Донецк ), formerly known as Aleksandrovka, Yuzivka (or Hughesovka), Stalin and Stalino (see also: Names of European cities in different languages (C–D), cities' alternat ...

, Ukraine to a Congolese father and a Russian mother of

Tatar The Tatars ()Tatar
in the Collins English Dictionary is an umbrella term for different

origin. The family moved to

Fort Worth, Texas Fort Worth is the fifth-largest city in the U.S. state of Texas and the 13th-largest city in the United States. It is the county seat of Tarrant County, covering nearly into four other counties: Denton, Johnson, Parker, and Wise. According ...

when Bolomboy was less than three years old. While in college, he told the ''

Standard-Examiner The ''Standard-Examiner'' is a daily morning newspaper published in Ogden, Utah, United States. With roughly 30,000 subscribers on Sunday and 25,000 daily, it is the third largest daily newspaper in terms of circulation in Utah, after ''The Sal ...

'' that he did not "remember anything" about Ukraine and felt like he had "never been there." He went to high school at Keller Central High School in Fort Worth, and chose Weber State for college despite interest from larger schools such as Clemson,

Auburn Auburn may refer to: Places Australia * Auburn, New South Wales * City of Auburn, the local government area *Electoral district of Auburn *Auburn, Queensland, a locality in the Western Downs Region *Auburn, South Australia *Auburn, Tasmania *Aub ...

and

Florida State Florida State University (FSU) is a public university, public research university in Tallahassee, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida. Founded in 1851, it is located on the oldest continuous site of higher e ...

. During his college career, Bolomboy became the all-time leading rebounder in Weber State and

Big Sky Conference The Big Sky Conference (BSC) is a collegiate athletic conference affiliated with the NCAA's Division I with football competing in the Football Championship Subdivision. Member institutions are located in the western United States in the eigh ...

history. While always a strong rebounder, Bolomboy increased his scoring average in the 2015–16 season, averaging 17.9

points per game Points per game, often abbreviated PPG, is the average number of points scored by a player per game played in a sport, over the course of a series of games, a whole season, or a career. It is calculated by dividing the total number of points by nu ...

to go along with 12.8 rebounds per game. Following the season, Bolomboy was named first-team All-

, as well as the league's Player of the Year and Defensive Player of the Year.

Professional career

Utah Jazz (2016–2017)

On June 23, 2016, Bolomboy was selected by the

Utah Jazz The Utah Jazz are an American professional basketball team based in Salt Lake City. The Jazz compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the league's Western Conference (NBA), Western Conference, Northwest Division (NBA), ...

with the 52nd pick in the 2016 NBA draft. On August 19, 2016, he signed with the Jazz. He made his NBA debut on October 30, 2016, recording three points, one rebound, one assist, one steal and one block in four minutes off the bench in an 88–75 loss to the

Los Angeles Clippers The Los Angeles Clippers are an American professional basketball team based in Los Angeles. The Clippers compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the Pacific Division in the league's Western Conference. The Clipper ...

. During his rookie season, Bolomboy had multiple assignments with the

Salt Lake City Stars The Salt Lake City Stars are an American professional basketball team in the NBA G League based in Salt Lake City, Utah, and are affiliated with the Utah Jazz. As of the 2022-23 season, the Stars play in the Maverik Center in West Valley City, U ...

, Utah's

D-League The NBA G League, or simply the G League, is the National Basketball Association's (NBA) official minor league basketball organization. The league was known as the National Basketball Development League (NBDL) from 2001 to 2005, and the NBA De ...

affiliate. In 26 games with the Stars, he averaged 16.5 points and 13.3 rebounds per contest. On October 16, 2017, Bolomboy was waived by the Jazz.

Milwaukee Bucks (2017–2018)

On October 20, 2017, Bolomboy signed a

two-way contract A two-way contract is a professional sports contract that stipulates that an athlete's salary is dependent upon the league in which the athlete is assigned to play. This is opposed to a one-way contract that would pay the same salary regardless of ...

with the

Milwaukee Bucks The Milwaukee Bucks are an American professional basketball team based in Milwaukee. The Bucks compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the league's Eastern Conference Central Division. The team was founded in 1968 ...

via their

NBA G League The NBA G League, or simply the G League, is the National Basketball Association's (NBA) official List of developmental and minor sports leagues, minor league basketball organization. The league was known as the National Basketball Development ...

affiliate the

Wisconsin Herd The Wisconsin Herd are an American professional basketball team in the NBA G League based in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, and are affiliated with the Milwaukee Bucks. The Herd play their home games at Oshkosh Arena. History On June 29, 2016, it was annou ...

. Throughout the length of his deal, he would split his playing time between the Bucks and their G League affiliate. However, Bolomboy would be waived from the team on January 7, 2018, after signing

Xavier Munford Xavier Tyler Jerome Munford (born June 1, 1992) is an American professional basketball player for Hapoel Tel Aviv of the Israeli Basketball Premier League and the Eurocup. He played two seasons of college basketball for the Rhode Island Rams. ...

to a

of his own accord.

Wisconsin Herd (2018)

On January 10, 2018, Bolomboy re-signed with the

CSKA Moscow (2018–2022)

Bolomboy was signed by

CSKA Moscow CSKA Moscow (russian: ЦСКА Москва) is a Russian sports club based in Moscow. It was created in 1911 in the Russian Empire on base of OLLS (Skiing Society, founded 1901). Later, during the Soviet Union, Soviet era, it was a central piece ...

of the

VTB United League VTB United League (russian: Единая Лига ВТБ) is an international professional men's club basketball list of basketball leagues, league that was founded in 2008. It is made up of mostly Russian clubs, along with one each from Belarus an ...

on August 8, 2018, on a three-year deal. On March 2, 2020, he signed a two-year extension with the club. On 28 February 2022, Bolomboy left CSKA Moscow for personal reasons related to the

Russian invasion of Ukraine On 24 February 2022, in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, which began in 2014. The invasion has resulted in tens of thousands of deaths on both sides. It has caused Europe's largest refugee crisis since World War II. An ...

Olympiacos (2022–present)

On 6 July 2022, Bolomboy signed a one-year deal with

of the

and the Euroleague.

International career

Bolomboy was invited to try out for the

Ukraine national basketball team The Ukraine men's national basketball team ( uk, збірна України з баскетболу) represents Ukraine in international basketball competitions. They are controlled by the Basketball Federation of Ukraine. After Ukrainian In ...

in advance of the

2014 FIBA Basketball World Cup The 2014 FIBA Basketball World Cup was the 17th edition of the FIBA Basketball World Cup, the tournament previously known as the FIBA World Championship. Hosted by Spain, it was the last tournament to be held on the then-current four-year cycle ...

. He was injured while practicing for the tournament and was unable to appear in any games. He was named to the Ukrainian team's preliminary roster in advance of

EuroBasket 2017 EuroBasket 2017 was the 40th edition of the EuroBasket championship that was organized by FIBA Europe and held between 31 August and 17 September 2017. Beginning from 2017, the continental championships take place every four years with a similar ...

but did not appear on the final roster. In November 2018, Bolomboy became a

Russian citizen Russian citizenship law details the conditions by which a person holds citizenship of Russia. The primary law governing citizenship requirements is the federal law "On Citizenship of the Russian Federation", which came into force on 1 July 2002. ...

. Bolomboy played for the

Russia national basketball team The Russia men's national basketball team (russian: национа́льная сбо́рная Росси́и по баскетболу, natsionalnaya sbornaya rossii po basketbolu) represents Russia in international basketball competition. Th ...

during the 2019 FIBA Basketball World Cup qualifiers and the EuroBasket 2022 qualifiers. He missed the

2019 FIBA Basketball World Cup The 2019 FIBA Basketball World Cup was the 18th tournament of the FIBA Basketball World Cup for men's national basketball teams. The tournament was hosted in China and was rescheduled from 2018 to 2019, becoming the first since 1967 FIBA World Ch ...

due to injury.

Career statistics

Regular season

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Utah Utah ( , ) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. Utah is a landlocked U.S. state bordered to its east by Colorado, to its northeast by Wyoming, to its north by Idaho, to its south by Arizona, and to it ...

, 12 , , 0 , , 4.4 , , .563 , , .250 , , '.500 , , 1.4 , , .2 , , .1 , , .2 , , 1.8 , - , align="left" , , align="left" ,

Milwaukee Milwaukee ( ), officially the City of Milwaukee, is both the most populous and most densely populated city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin and the county seat of Milwaukee County. With a population of 577,222 at the 2020 census, Milwaukee is ...

, 6 , , 0 , , 6.3 , , .500 , , .000 , , .500 , , 1.7 , , .0 , , .3 , , .0 , , 1.5 , - class="sortbottom" , style="text-align:center;" colspan="2", Career , 18 , , 0 , , 5.1 , , .545 , , .200 , , .500 , , 1.5 , , .1 , , .2 , , .1 , , 1.7

Playoffs

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, 2 , , 0 , , 4.5 , , .667 , , .000 , , .000 , , 1.0 , , .0 , , .0 , , .5 , , 2.0 , - class="sortbottom" , align="center" colspan="2", Career , 2 , , 0 , , 4.5 , , .667 , , .000 , , .000 , , 1.0 , , .0 , , .0 , , .5 , , 2.0

EuroLeague

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, 28 , , 5 , , 9.1 , , .564 , , .462 , , .600 , , 1.9 , , .4 , , .1 , , .0 , , 2.6 , , 2.9 , - , style="text-align:left;", 2019–20 , 27 , , 1 , , 16.5 , , .562 , , .325 , , .743 , , 4.0, , .5 , , .3 , , .1 , , 5.4 , , 7.6 , - , style="text-align:left;",

2020–21 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen b ...

, 25 , , 9 , , 16.5 , , .623 , , .250 , , .771 , , 3.8 , , .3 , , .6, , .5 , , 5.4 , , 7.2 , - , style="text-align:left;", 2021–22 , 17 , , 4 , , 16.3 , , .609 , , .267 , , .778 , , 4.5 , , .4 , , .2 , , .2 , , 6.5 , , 8.5

References

External links

Weber State Wildcats bioJoel Bolomboy: My Life As An NBA Draft Prospect
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bolomboy, Joel 1994 births Living people category:Basketball players from Texas Centers (basketball) Milwaukee Bucks players National Basketball Association players from Ukraine Naturalised citizens of Russia PBC CSKA Moscow players Power forwards (basketball) Russian men's basketball players Russian people of Democratic Republic of the Congo descent Russian people of Tatar descent Salt Lake City Stars players Sportspeople from Donetsk Sportspeople from Fort Worth, Texas Ukrainian emigrants to Russia Ukrainian expatriate basketball people in Russia Ukrainian expatriate basketball people in the United States Ukrainian men's basketball players Ukrainian people of Democratic Republic of the Congo descent Ukrainian people of Russian descent Utah Jazz draft picks Utah Jazz players Weber State Wildcats men's basketball players Wisconsin Herd players