Karl-Anthony Towns’ desire to play for the Dominican Republic was born out of a love as immense as the pain that has brought him back for the 2023 Basketball World Cup.
Towns was born in New Jersey, the son of an American father, Karl Towms Sr., and a Dominican mother, Jacqueline Cruz. She was his pillar, and the one who always kept him in touch with his Quintana Roo roots.
At his mother’s family gatherings they ate sancocho or rice with chicken and tostones. They danced bachata and merengue. They celebrated those Dominican origins that he met in person on his first visit to his mother’s country as a teenager.
In fact, Karl-Anthony Towns’ first dream was to be a professional baseball player, the national sport of the Caribbean country. But his height and having a father who was a basketball coach made him opt for the orange ball.
But he would not do it with his native country, the United States, but with the country of his mother, his lighthouse, the Dominican Republic.
Source: Olympics.com
