{"id":35089,"date":"2017-07-12T13:57:54","date_gmt":"2017-07-12T11:57:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/web.demo.olimpia.iquii.info\/the-inspirational-story-of-our-mini-mamba-andrew-goudelock\/"},"modified":"2017-07-12T13:57:54","modified_gmt":"2017-07-12T11:57:54","slug":"the-inspirational-story-of-our-mini-mamba-andrew-goudelock","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.olimpiamilano.com\/en\/the-inspirational-story-of-our-mini-mamba-andrew-goudelock\/","title":{"rendered":"The inspirational story of our Mini-Mamba, Andrew Goudelock"},"content":{"rendered":"

Andrew Goudelock, the Mini-Mamba from East Atlanta<\/strong> – like MarShon Brooks – had decided to spend 30 minutes on a search engine hunting for pictures of himself to be used for a special gift to his mom. <\/span>Suddenly he discovered the existence of a man with the very same name, years earlier, in the same area of \u200b\u200bthe United States. <\/span>He was a school-level football player. <\/span>His face was familiar. <\/span>Goudelock had just to look in a mirror to see that face. <\/span>That man was his uncle.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

His heart paused for a moment<\/strong> because that was the most incredible story Goudelock had ever read. <\/span>Uncle Drew was an emerging football school player in Georgia, perhaps destined to the NFL. <\/span>But one very bad day he was diagnosed with bone cancer. <\/span>After a few days, they amputated one of his legs. <\/span>When his team resumed training, Drew Goudelock appeared in the locker room anyway. <\/span>He would continue to play football without prostheses, running on one leg. <\/span>Courage, perseverance, heart. <\/span>Drew Goudelock was summoned for Georgia’s football All-Star Game. <\/span>He received a standing ovation of five minutes. <\/span>That story was a shock to his nephew Andrew Goudelock. He never knew the story. Nobody told him. <\/span>Uncle Drew died after four years of courage and suffering. <\/span>The tumor extended to the lungs and caused a tragic, early, end. It happened on January 5, 1986. He was 19 years old. <\/span>One of his brothers, Greg, decided that his first son would be named after him to extend the legacy.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

Andrew Goudelock was not a star when he left Stone Mountain high school,<\/strong> even though in the summer he played for the AAU’s Atlanta Celtics, an organization in which several future pros like Dwight Howard, Josh Smith, KJ McDaniels, passed through. <\/span>Only two One Division colleges offered him a scholarship: Kennesaw State and Charleston. <\/span>Charleston coach was Bobby Cremins, a tough New Yorker and previously a great coach at Georgia Tech. <\/span>Cremins knew Goudelock’s stepfather, Marvin Austin, and convinced him to push his son towards Charleston. <\/span>“I was uncoachable, we argued all the time,” Goudelock said to ESPN, “I was on a bad path<\/span>, but he did not give up on me. I do not know how but he stayed with me.” <\/span>Goudelock became a starter at Charleston in his first year, he was the leading scorer for the last three years and the best in assists in the last two. <\/span>Charleston even defeated North Carolina in overtime, a historic feat for a small college: Goudelock scored the three to extend the game<\/span><\/a>. <\/span>A “one-man show” that led Charleston<\/a><\/span> to the Southern Conference’s title in 2011. Goudelock is still the school All-Time leading scorer, and the third All-Time scorer in the Southern conference. <\/span>He had 39 points in a single game, a career-best.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

Goudelock was chosen in the 2011 draft by the Los Angeles Lakers as the 46th selection. <\/span><\/strong>The Lakers had won their last NBA title in 2010, were eliminated from the eventual champions, the Dallas Mavericks, in 2011 and changed coach, with Mike Brown replacing Phil Jackson. <\/span>“When I came to the Lakers I was third-string guard. The regulars had the purple jerseys, the reserves had the yellow jerseys, and I was wearing the pink jersey. It meant that there were days when I did not play five on five even during practice”.<\/span> His contract was not guaranteed. <\/span>He tried to save himself by winning all the sprints in training or talking more than anybody at the defensive end of the floor. Then Coach <\/span>Brown used him against the Clippers in pre-season. H<\/span>e was tentative and took some bad shots. <\/span>Then he relaxed and made three threes. <\/span>The next day Kobe Bryant told him to go see Mitch Kupchak, the general manager, in his office. <\/span>In the NBA it means that you’ve been cut. <\/span>Instead it was a joke … That’s how a special relationship with Kobe began. <\/span>“It was a huge opportunity for me to compete all year against the greatest competitor in the world. I think he respected me because I was the only one who was not scared by him,” he told to nba.com. <\/span>It was after a game in Charlotte that Bryant invented for him the nickname “Mini-Mamba”, “because we are the only one to never be afraid to take a shot.”<\/span><\/p>\n

He played 43 games with the Lakers that year,<\/strong> including the playoffs, with 4.4 points on average. <\/span>The next season he spent most of his time in the D-League. <\/span>He played in Rio Grande and Sioux Falls, and was named the league’s MVP, after averaging 21.1 points per game<\/a><\/span>. <\/span>At the end of the season, he was signed back by the Lakers where there was a new coach: Mike D’Antoni. <\/span>They qualified for the playoffs but were devastated by too many injuries. <\/span>Kobe Bryant was out, Steve Blake too, so did Jodie Meeks. <\/span>D’Antoni did not have a choice: he forced him in the starting line-up. <\/span>Goudelock responded by averaging 12.0 points per game in 26 minutes, with a high of 20<\/a><\/span>, even though the Lakers were swept away 4-0 by San Antonio.<\/span><\/p>\n

The following summer was the one in which Olimpia<\/strong> tried to sign him for the first time. <\/span>He dominated the Las Vegas summer league with the Chicago Bulls (19.0 points per game, making 52.2% of his threes and a season-high of 31 points<\/a><\/span>). He was playing the point as he had done in the D-League the previous winter, d<\/span>istributing 5.8 assists per game. <\/span>Goudelock had this offer from Olimpia to play as a scoring point-guard, the role that would eventually be taken by Curtis Jerrells, because he – in fact – turned the offer down at the last minute. Kazan made a huge proposal and he signed. <\/span>With Unics he was the Eurocup MVP, with his team making the final against Valencia. He was also the Russian Cup MVP, a competition that Unics won. “Many players have told me that Kazan is the toughest place to start a European career,” he said to <\/span>Ian Thomsen of nba.com. “In the winter you cannot really drive because the car slips all over the road; it’s so cold that you cannot even put on twenty scarves and boots. Besides, very few people can speak any English.”<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

With a sky-high reputation, he went to Fenerbahce Istanbul,<\/strong> twice was named EuroLeague’s MVP of the week, scored 10 threes in a game against Bayern Munich, setting a EuroLeague All-Time record, averaged 17.0 points per game and made 46.1% of his threes. <\/span>Fenerbahce came to the Final Four (he scored the winning basket in Tel Aviv to clinch the series<\/a><\/span>) and scored 26 points in the semi-final game against Real Madrid, the eventual winner. <\/span>He scored 50 points in two games combined. <\/span>It was named to the All-EuroLeague teams. <\/span>“With Coach Obradovic you have to defend and that’s what I did: if you do not defend you don’t play, I did not have a choice,” he said. <\/span>During his season in Fenerbahce he also scored 30 points in a exhibition game in Istanbul against the Spurs<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n