Ex-Lake Oswego coach Marshall Cho leads World Team at Nike Hoop Summit: ‘It was a privilege and an honor’
SB Live Sports | By René Ferrán | April 15, 2024
Marshall Cho sat on the podium after the biggest night of his coaching career and flashed a smile.
“Anyone else hungry?” the former Lake Oswego coach asked the media gathered before him at the Moda Center after Saturday night’s Nike Hoop Summit.
Cho, who won 132 games at Lake Oswego over eight seasons, was named head coach for Team World for the 25th anniversary of the annual all-star basketball game — the culmination of a long journey in the USA Basketball system that started 12 years ago with him picking up players at the airport and performing other grunt work as a support staff member.
Last year, Cho — who was born on Jeju Island in South Korea and immigrated to the U.S. as a 10-year-old — was an assistant coach for the World team, and he took over as head coach this year.
Before becoming the Lakers head coach, Cho spent three years in Mozambique as a volunteer coach with the East African country’s national federation and the varsity coach at the American International School of Mozambique.
He also was a coach with the NBA’s Basketball Without Borders Africa program, which gave him the ideal resumé to lead the international squad.
“Obviously, it was a great challenge just going up against the gold standard,” Cho said after his team fell 98-75 to Team USA. “But I can be proud of our guys. We built a family for life. We’re building global citizens here on this side. For us to be able to be here in Portland, Oregon, is a beautiful thing.”
The only downside, Cho joked, was that “my entire family was lined up to see their dad and uncle and son get the tar beat out of him in that fourth quarter.”
“I’m sorry,” said V.J. Edgecombe, a Bahamian sitting to his right, eliciting a laugh from his coach.
“No need to apologize,” Cho said. “That’s OK. It’s part of the game. If anybody can take this loss, it’s me, because I know that I’m going to go out there to people who love me. It’s like with these guys. That’s the things you keep.”
Unlike the American team that had nine players with previous national team experience, the World team comes together the week of the Summit and gets 10 practices, a shootaround and a workout at the Nike campus.
For them to remain competitive with Team USA for 25 minutes as they did Saturday night — the score was tied 50-50 with just over five minutes left in the third quarter — was an accomplishment for the World team.
“You guys got to see all week the potential that these guys have,” Cho said. “You need some patience along the way, but I think each of them will have a lot of success.”
Cho then related how his experience moving from South Korea to Springfield, Ore., in grade school helped him relate to some of the players on his roster, such as 6-foot-11 post Ulrich Chomche of Cameroon and 7-2 center (and Duke commit) Khaman Maluach of South Sudan, both of whom play for NBA Academy Africa.
“I know what it’s like to come from nothing and have to sacrifice everything,” Cho said. “So, in that sense, it was a privilege and an honor to be the first person to welcome a lot of these players coming into our country.
“With everything that the NBA wants to pour into the continent, we’re like at a breaking point. They care. They’re coachable. They’re asking all the right questions. We got beat on the rebounding numbers today (Team USA held a 50-28 rebounding edge), but watch what they do in the short amount of time. We’ll see what they can build.”