NBA – Shai Gilgeous-Alexander on France’s Ousmane Dieng: “I might as well not waste my time”

Par Pierre-Andréa Fraile | Journaliste sportif

Drafted by the Thunder in 2022, Ousmane Dieng immediately met Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and hasn’t left him since. In the midst of the Finals, the recent MVP made a major confession about his French teammate.

In a matter of hours, he could become the seventh French player in history to be crowned NBA champion. This, despite his reduced playing time since the start of the playoffs. Ousmane Dieng can nonetheless take pride in being part of the Thunder’s adventure, who are now just one victory away from lifting the Larry O’Brien trophy and completing the remarkable season of their star, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s honest admission about Ousmane Dieng

Voted MVP a few weeks ago, Shai has assumed his position since the start of the postseason, including in this decisive series against the Pacers. Proof that he’s not one to crumble under pressure, nor back down from the slightest challenge. On the floor at least. Indeed, according to Rémi Reverchon of beIN Sports, he refuses to challenge Ousmane Dieng… on FIFA :

Rémi Reverchon: Shai, you know I’m French, so I have to tell you that I may have a French informant on your team. I’m not going to say who it is, but he told me a few things about you, like the fact that you don’t want to play FIFA against him because you’re afraid of losing. Is that really true?

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander: That’s definitely Ousmane Dieng!

The Canadian star was quick to identify the source of this somewhat compromising information about him… and made no attempt to offer the slightest denial:

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander: Yes, that’s true. I saw him play FIFA once and he was too good, so I thought, “I might as well not waste my time.”

Lucid about his level on the famous videogame soccer simulation, SGA wouldn’t really have the time to improve it because of his family life:

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander: I used to play a lot with Lu (Dort) for a while, but that was a long time ago, maybe four or five years ago. Now I’ve got kids, I’ve got a wife… I don’t have time to play FIFA anymore. I’ve given up video games. Now it’s my kids who play video games, and I’m doing grown-up things.

In any case, it’s a safe bet that he’ll opt for a title and the title of Finals MVP, rather than a victory over Dieng with the controller in hand.