Saitama –

This weekend’s NBA Japan Games 2022 allowed the country’s basketball fans to celebrate the return of native son Rui Hachimura for the first time as a member of the Washington Wizards.

It was also a chance for the league to take its own victory lap and tout not only its global popularity, but also the number of players developed outside the United States who are now competing at the sport’s highest level.

“We have over 100 foreign players in the NBA, including a couple Japanese players in Yuta (Watanabe) and Rui,” Golden State Warriors head coach Steve Kerr said before Friday’s game at Saitama Super Arena. “I think the international component of the game has added so much in terms of not only fan interest but talent — there’s so much elite talent that comes from overseas right now.

“The NBA over the last 30 years or so, has just become such a phenomenon worldwide and it’s only made our league that much better.”

Hachimura, who in 2019 became the first Japanese player to be selected in the first round of the NBA draft when he was taken at No. 9 by the Wizards, has been the star of the show since his team arrived in Tokyo on Wednesday, with the number of reporters following him dwarfing those who covered his exploits for Japan during the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.

After leading his team with 13 points from 25 minutes on the court in Friday’s 96-87 loss, a smiling Hachimura expressed his gratitude for the experience of being able to represent his NBA team on home soil.

“It was great for me, and for this country, Japan, and basketball,” Hachimura said during a standing-room-only news conference. “It was one of those things I dreamed about since I was a kid, and I was so happy about it. It was a big moment for me and this country.”

Hachimura’s local popularity wasn't lost on his teammates, who were happy to let him take the lion’s share of the spotlight during their visit.

“I get to breathe,” Wizards shooting guard Bradley Beal said with a laugh when asked on Thursday about the media buzz around Hachimura. “I’m happy for him, it’s amazing to see.

“I love the fact that everyone here seems supportive of Rui. He needs it — he represents us well, he represents this country well, and I’m happy to be his teammate.”

The preseason series between the Wizards and the reigning NBA champion Warriors was the second to take place in Japan through the league’s partnership with local distribution partner Rakuten. After the 2019 visit by the Houston Rockets and Toronto Raptors to Saitama, plans began to form for the Wizards to make their own Japan trip — only for the project to be shelved due to the coronavirus pandemic.

That didn’t stop Washington from building a loyal audience across the Pacific Ocean. The Wizards’ Japanese digital media team, which produces a steady stream of video and social content on the team’s website and a Japanese-language Twitter account followed by more than 85,000 fans, earned a Shorty Award nomination for its outreach efforts in 2020. In July, Washington received the NBA’s International Strategy Award for the 2021-22 season, with league officials citing the team’s marketing successes in Asia and the Middle East.

“Having the NBA Japan Games for the first time in three years is a big thing, but for the Wizards to be involved for the first time in the franchise’s history, and for their first time abroad in four years to be in Japan, that’s huge,” said Zac Ikuma, the team’s Japanese-language correspondent. “This has been two years in the making ... for this to finally come to fruition is awesome.

“Some people recognized me (outside the arena), which is nice, but it’s not about being recognized — it’s about the work that we’ve done. We’ve put in so much work, especially in subtitling things, so we can break that language barrier.”

This weekend’s Japan Games marked the NBA’s 15th and 16th games in Japan, which hosted 12 regular-season contests between 1990 and 2003 in Tokyo, Yokohama and Saitama.

The breadth of local interest in the NBA could be seen in uniforms worn by those in attendance on Friday, with the Miami Heat, Brooklyn Nets and Los Angeles Lakers among the many teams represented alongside the Wizards and Warriors.

Twenty-year-old Kyoshiro Tanaka, wearing the uniform of Philadelphia 76ers star Joel Embiid, said Ray Allen’s clutch 3-pointer for Miami against the San Antonio Spurs in Game 6 of the 2013 NBA Finals inspired him to start playing as an elementary school student.

“The Wizards and the Warriors are very popular in Japan, but I wanted everyone here to know that there are also great teams like Philadelphia,” Tanaka said.

It was clear he wasn’t the only one among the announced crowd of 20,497 who had a deep appreciation for the league.

Former Warriors center Zaza Pachulia, Romanian giant Gheorghe Muresan, and eight-time All-Star Dikembe Mutombo were among a number of retired NBA greats to get loud ovations from the fans during Friday’s game, a sign that the league’s popularity in Japan extends far beyond all-time superstars such as Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant and LeBron James — as well as Warriors star Stephen Curry, who Hachimura joked had a larger following than his own.

“I can feel that basketball in Japan is growing,” Hachimura said. “I think the NBA and Japan are becoming closer and that makes me really happy.”