Difficult coronavirus-related travel decisions faced Davidson, Charlotte 49ers international players

Concerns about the coronavirus sent Nelson Boachie-Yiadom far from Davidson’s campus, where he recently finished up his sophomore season as a forward on the Wildcats’ basketball team.

But Boachie-Yiadom didn’t return to London to be with his parents and sister. Instead, he jumped in a car with teammate Mike Jones and made the 17-hour drive to Jones’ home in Woodbury, Minn., where they’re riding out the threat.

It wasn’t an easy decision for Boachie-Yiadom, one of the combined 10 international players on Mecklenburg County’s two NCAA Division I basketball teams — Davidson and Charlotte.

“My family’s a little bit anxious,” Boachie-Yiadom said in a phone interview with the Observer from Minnesota. “My mum misses me. But I always call home every day and I text my sister to make sure she’s OK.”

Waiting to play in the Atlantic 10 tournament in New York, Davidson’s season ended prematurely on March 11. When the Wildcats returned to campus later that night, there were still questions as to how severe the outbreak of the virus would be.

“We wanted to be as vigilant as possible in giving the guys an opportunity to get back to their families,” said Wildcats coach Bob McKillop. “In many cases, their initial reaction was, ‘Coach, there’s no weight room at home, so we want to stay here.’ ”

Based on the information available at the time, Boachie-Yiadom and Jones chose to stay in their dorm at Davidson, where they could walk to the Vance Athletic Center to work out and lift weights.

“We realized the severity of it by Saturday (March 21),” McKillop said. “The alarm was really sounding.”

When the college closed the facility later that week, the players were forced into a decision: stay on campus or return home?

Davidson’s American players either went home or, if they lived off campus, stayed there. But for Boachie-Yiadom and the five other international Wildcats, the decision was more complex:

▪ Three of them have returned home: forward Luka Brajkovic to Austria, guard David Czerapowicz to Sweden and guard-forward Hyunjung Lee to South Korea. Senior guard Jon Axel Gudmundsson (Iceland) has remained in the U.S., shuttling between Davidson and Richmond, Va., where his girlfriend lives.

▪ McKillop said freshman forward David Kristensen elected to stay in a dorm at Davidson with 100 other students rather than risk being exposed to the virus by traveling to Denmark.

▪ Forward Sam Mennenga, a recruit who enrolled at Davidson in January, is back home in New Zealand.

▪ Former Davidson player Dusan Kovacevic was unable to return to Serbia after the country’s border was closed, McKillop said. Kovacevic is an intern for the Charlotte Hornets.

Like Kristensen, Boachie-Yiadom was concerned about becoming infected while being on an airplane for several hours. So he took up Jones’ offer to drive to Minnesota.

“I basically thought, I might as well,” Boachie-Yiadom said. “It wasn’t going to be smart to be on a plane for seven hours.”

With Jones doing all the driving, the pair traveled for 12 hours the first day, spent the night at student manager Sourna Daneshvar’s house in Chicago, then went the final five hours the next day, about 1,300 miles total.

Boachie-Yiadom, who’s traveled internationally and also extensively as a Davidson player, said he’d never been through the American Midwest before.

“Nelson is the only person on the planet who thinks driving through Indiana is the coolest thing ever,” Jones said.

Boachie-Yiadom is staying in the Jones’ basement. While maintaining social distancing, Boachie-Yiadom and Jones are getting up shots on a backyard basket. They also put together a light-hearted video that was posted on Twitter.

McKillop said the Wildcats coaching staff and players have stayed in contact, including a meeting on Zoom one night last week.

“The interesting dynamic was figuring out all the time zones,” McKillop said. “Lee had to wake up at 6 a.m.; Sam a little later. It was almost midnight for Luka and David (Czerapowicz). We covered a lot of time zones.”

Closed border, canceled flight

Like Kovacevic, Charlotte 49ers sophomore Milos Supica, who is also from Serbia, was unable to return home after his flight was canceled when the Serbian border was closed due to virus concerns. So Supica is staying with the family that hosted him when he was a star at Fayetteville’s Freedom Christian Academy.

Supica says he talks with his parents and older sister regularly from their hometown of Belgrade. As of Tuesday, 900 cases of coronavirus had been confirmed in Serbia with 23 deaths.

“Serbia is in bad shape right now, it’s been going all around (Belgrade) and the country,” Supica said. “So my parents told me to just stay (in the U.S.) since it’s gotten so bad.”

Charlotte has three other international players on its 2019-20 roster. Freshman forward Anzac Rissetto returned to his hometown of Auckland, New Zealand. Guard Luka Vasic (Serbia) is in Charlotte, recovering from knee surgery. 49ers coach Ron Sanchez said he wasn’t certain of grad transfer Amidou Bamba’s whereabouts, but that he might be returning to his home in Toronto.

Like Davidson, the 49ers’ season ended before they were able to play a game in their Conference USA tournament.

“When this all first started, we didn’t know what was happening,” Sanchez said. “But when we got back and found out classes were probably going to be online, some guys asked if it was OK to go home. We obviously said yes and they started making plans.”

Sanchez and his staff have stayed in touch with his players through an on-campus video hookup, as well texting.

“There are no facilities for them to spend time and to workout in,” Sanchez said. “And as coaches we’re encouraging them not to sneak into facilities. Please be careful; be compliant. Don’t put your health at risk for anything.

“One thing you can do is go into the street with a basketball and work on your ball handling. You can do push ups and sit ups or go for a run. We’re encouraging those things.”

▪ Three former 49ers players who announced they’re entering the NCAA’s transfer portal have announced where they’re headed: Guard Malik Martin to Rhode Island; guard Cooper Robb to Eastern Kentucky; and guard Tyler Bertram to Binghamton. Guard Brandon Younger, who left the 49ers in January, still hasn’t announced a new school.

This story was originally published April 1, 2020 at 3:41 PM.