'The epitome of seriousness and strictness' Kim Jong-un, why his milestone is even greater
Dec 03, 2024
|
No, he's an amazing player. This is the story of Kim Jong-un of Hana Bank, the `living legend' of women's basketball.
Kim Jong-un scored 8 points in the match against Samsung Life in the 「Hana Bank 2023-2024 Women's Professional Basketball」 held at Bucheon Gymnasium on the 2nd, scoring 8,147 points in total, beating the 8,140 points held by former national team coach Jeong Sun-min to rank No. 1 in WKBL history.
Kim Jong-un, who fell just two points short of achieving a milestone until the previous game, became the main character of history with his unique jumper shot 25 seconds after the start of the game. But it was never light to get here. Kim Jong-un, who was named to Shinsegae (Hana Bank's predecessor team) as the No. 1 overall pick in the 2006 WKBL new player selection, has been on the court for 19 years since that winter season. Born in 1987, he is 37 years old this year, and of course, he is nearly 20 years apart from Chung Hyun and Ha Ji-yoon, who were born in 2006, the oldest women's professional basketball player and the youngest member of the team.
However, he still manages himself thoroughly enough to play for nearly 30 minutes every game. Although he has not been able to perform well in about two seasons due to calf and knee injuries, he has held the record of the youngest score in each section from 2000 to 8,000 points with a steady performance that has never rested the entire season since his debut.
Most significant of all is that most of the records were posted by Hana Bank, which has always been in the middle and lower ranks. It means that he threw and threw at the rim without giving in even when he did not get much help from his teammates. Kim Jong-un, who transferred to Woori Bank ahead of the 2017-2018 season and wore the winning ring for the first time as the MVP of the championship game that year, returned to his home team ahead of the 2023-2024 season, becoming a focal point for junior players and showing his seriousness and passion on the court, which is more important than anything else.
Kim Jong-un was only briefly happy at the moment of the milestone's achievement, but he couldn't end it with laughter as his team lost on the day. After the game, Kim Jong-un said, `It's still painful to play like this, I'm so sorry to the fans who came to congratulate me"He blamed himself. However, it is certain that this kind of "strictness" has made Kim Jong Un what he is now. Kim Jong-un said "He is strict with himself, but I felt that he had a hard time."
Kim Jong-un, who achieved 7,000 points, said that it was the most difficult until reaching 8,000 points after the Samsung Life Insurance match on January 19, 2020, "It is a record posted by walking all the souls. There were a lot of injury issues, but there were a lot of thoughts that I really had to quit, and there were a lot of frustrations, but I want to set a record like this and praise myself." With his goal of winning the championship and achieving MVP more than a decade ago already achieved, there is only one left: '10,000 points'. Kim Jong-un said, `It's okay now, if not to achieve 10,000 points. I think it's a miracle that we've come this far"But "Coming back to the friendship team and achieving the milestone is also meaningful, and thank you so much for doing the event after achieving the record at WKBL. He lowered himself again, saying, "He's not even a great player." Achieving 10,000 points will never be an impossible goal because Kim Jong-un is still humble even in such a happy moment. No, there's something more meaningful than that. From now on, the score to be raised is a new record made by oneself and the history of WKBL.
bluesky@sportschosun.com
