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On December 10th, teammates and fans of Northwestern State gave their new freshman basketball player a round of applause when he scored his first points for the team.
Due to the fact that Hansel Emmanuel only has one arm, the ovation for the point guard was made to be more memorable.
The crowd of 1,600 people stood up when he added to his total with a thunderous slam a minute later in what became a 91-73 triumph over Louisiana-Monroe. This brought the crowd to its feet.
But this is by no means the beginning of Hansel Emmanuel’s story: as early as the previous year, ESPN was already reporting that college recruiting evaluators were interested in the young guy from from the Dominican Republic.
When he was six years old, he was playing on top of a cinderblock wall when it suddenly fell under him, crushing his arm and requiring amputation.
But just like every other elite athlete, he never stopped training hard, he never let anyone feel sorry for him, and he quickly began to build up a significant following on social media by posting short videos of himself playing street ball.
The head coach of Life Christian Academy in Florida is one of Emmanual’s father’s old colleagues, and the films that were posted on social media grabbed the notice of this former teammate.
Emmanual’s father was a professional in the Dominican Republic.
Emmanual was awarded a scholarship to attend his school, and not long after that, the one-armed guard won the state title, attracting the attention of college scouts.
The beginning of our voyage was in January of 2021. After only 23 months, Emmanual, now 19 years old, has tallied his first points while playing at the collegiate level.
On the previous Saturday, he shot two of three from the field and one of five from the free throw line in eight minutes, tallying two rebounds.
According to a comment that was published on the website of the school that competes in the Southland Conference, Emmanuel stated, “I had to keep going after the layup—it was my first bucket.”
“I am certain that my loved ones were pleased. I had to keep working. You can’t just give up, can you?
Watch the video…