By: Gabe Maturo
From D3 basketball to YouTube fame to the TBT courts.
D’Vontay Friga – whose YouTube channel has 588k subscribers – will be suiting up for Team Challenge ALS in TBT 2021.
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ant5CqIOBpo" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>GM Sean Marshall was the first one to reach out to D’Vontay about playing in the tournament.
The two met for the first time at Sean’s training company – Pro’s Vision – which is also run by former NBA star & Team Challenge ALS coach Darren Collison.
“We have a training company in California called Pro’s Vision,” said Marshall. “Aside from training high-level athletes, we were doing these 3v3 ‘influencer’ games for our YouTube channel. We would bring in ‘influencers’ to film the 3v3s for their YouTube channel and for our YouTube channel.”
“I have a good relationship with White Iverson who I’ve known for some years now. He told me D’Vontay was coming out to play at a park in California. So, I reached out and asked if he would play in a 3v3 game and then we set it up.”
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/jnoZDx0m0RQ" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>While completing his roster for TBT, Marshall knew that he wanted to have one influencer on his team in order to draw more awareness to the team’s cause.
“I wanted to put one influencer on our team from the start. They have huge followings on social media so it would bring a lot of attention to the cause.”
“I had D’Vontay’s number from that time I played with him and so I figured I would ask him to see if he would join us. He was interested and he started asking questions. Once he understood the cause and why we play he was hooked.”
Although Sean was looking for an influencer, he wasn’t just taking anybody. He wanted a guy that could legitimately play at this level and one that could contribute to a roster full of pros with a bounty of experience.
“I think we have a really good team and I’m not handing anything out to anybody,” said Marshall. “He’s gonna have to come in and prove himself in training camp. If he does that, he will earn the right to play a lot of minutes for us”
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">I got permission to Vlog and record behind the scenes for the TBT next week! I'll be Mic'd up and filming everything ! I'll be playing on ESPN July 16th at 6pm Central Time / 7pm EST! The team I'm on is Team Challenge ALS and our first game is AGAINST "Team D3" Ofcourse 😂</p>— DVontay Friga (@dfriga98) <a href="https://twitter.com/dfriga98/status/1413216300046893057?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 8, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>“He was by far one of the best influencers I could have recruited to play in TBT.”
Marshall, however, does speak highly of Friga’s abilities on the court.
“I think he’s a good player. I told him I’m not just bringing you on the team to be an influencer. I’m putting you on this team because I think you can play professionally.
“I think the thing that really stood out is his knowledge of the game. You have somebody who hasn’t played at a professional level and who has made a name for himself playing street ball. But, he understands spacing and he communicates well. He’s tough. He’s tough enough to play in TBT.”
Many are questioning how D’Vontay will fare on the professional stage, being it his first stint at the next level.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">•I didn't make my middle school basketball team<br>•I had 0 offers in highschool <br>•I played JV in D3 for a year <br>•just a youtube kid<br>---- <a href="https://twitter.com/espn?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@espn</a> had us playing on ESPN3 at first and now the main ESPN channel.. fuck what the obstacles tell you... just go get what you want.💯 <a href="https://t.co/SbSPGIjcMq">https://t.co/SbSPGIjcMq</a></p>— DVontay Friga (@dfriga98) <a href="https://twitter.com/dfriga98/status/1413218475754020872?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 8, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>“This is probably the biggest stage he has ever played on,” said Marshall.
“This will be the first pro basketball event that I have played in,” said Friga. “I have played against pro athletes all over from NBA players to Olympic players, though.”
Friga’s rise to YouTube stardom all began around the time of his junior season of college basketball at Division 3 Mount Union.
D’Vontay started a YouTube channel because he wanted to start doing daily blogs and becoming a content creator.
“I actually started my channel because I loved the way Casey Neistit was able to tell a story on YouTube,” said Friga. “So I picked up a camera and started doing a daily blog.”
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/SK9Ft0a0IMs" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>As many people know, it only takes one video to become popular. And that is all it took for D’Vontay to realize he had a page that was beginning to draw public attention.
“So I did the blogs for 80-some days and then one day I did a ‘Day in the Life of a D3 Basketball player’ and that video ended up getting 13k views in a whole week,” said Friga.
“So I started freaking out and started making more Division 3 basketball videos. I thought that there could be a market for this because there are people that want to know more about D3. I wanted to stick out and I was the only person doing Division 3 basketball content.”
As he was heading into his senior year, the page grew even more.
“I did that all of junior year and then I carried that into senior year,” said Friga. “I documented every day in my life as a division 3 basketball player the whole season and I went from 60k to 100k followers on YouTube.”
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ivbD9Keyqzs" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>Unfortunately, as Friga’s team was preparing for the NCAA Division 3 Tournamentfinal, the season was cut short due to the emerging Coronavirus pandemic. Along with the season, his college basketball career was officially over.
“At the end of my season, my team was ranked number two in the nation before Covid cut our season short.”
What happened next would change D’Vontay’s life forever.
With no basketball season to be documented, Friga decided to start playing at a local park in his home state of Florida. Little did he know that this would be the start of a YouTube page that would gain popularity like wildfire in the coming months.
“I started recording myself playing and mic’d myself up at Jim Jeffers Park in Florida,” said Friga. “The video got 2.3 million views and in 5 days I went from 105k subscribers to 250k subscribers.”
But, once again, the ongoing pandemic stepped in the way, causing parks and gyms to be closed all around the country to prevent the spread of the virus.
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/tvc_-S6HvRQ" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>This would not prove to be an issue for Friga.
“So, my dad and I had the idea to build our own basketball court. He then built a basketball court in the 5 acres we own in Fort Myers, Florida and it started drawing a lot of attention.”
Once Covid restrictions became less strict, that opened up the scene for Friga to continue drawing crowds at parks all over the United States. Meanwhile, his page continued to shine with popularity.
“When Covid finally stopped messing things up, we started going to parks across the country again.”
Although he will be playing professionally in TBT this summer, that wasn’t always his primary goal.
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/JcdoejVRZwg" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>“So I actually wanted to play pro basketball after Division 3 but YouTube was a bigger focus for me,” said Friga. “Everything I wanted in life, I went after with relentless passion. When it came to pro basketball, I never had the itch for it and I never thought that this is what I had to do.”
However, D’Vontay has been grinding nonstop to prepare himself for every basketball opportunity that is thrown his way.
“My whole life basketball has been my therapy,” said Friga. “Although I’ve been busy, it is nice to play basketball by myself with no cameras around. I am just staying ready. I literally haven’t stopped playing basketball since my season ended in March 2020. And even then I was in college, so I legit haven’t stopped playing basketball for 12 years.”
While he has been playing with high-level talent since graduating from Mount Union, Friga still gives credit to the Division 3 program for preparing him for this level.
“Being at Mount Union on and off the court prepared me for stuff like this. The opportunity to be on Mount Union’s team gave me more opportunities to play against Division 1 and Division 2 guys in summer leagues.”
When asked about his nerves heading into TBT 2021, Friga said, “For the last 6 months, I have been inviting massive crowds out to these local parks. So I don’t think I’ll be nervous playing in front of a lot of people.”
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/zSH4ZycfJvs" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>He also talked about his goals for the tournament, saying, “The only thing I want to focus on is to defensively be that guy. I want my teammates to know that I am not just on the court to score. I want people to know that I am the most active and outspoken player on the court.”
“I have to know my place among these pros. I want to be that guy that’s okay with having six in a game but people know that I stuck out for being a leader on the team. I want to be the loudest person.”
Although he is known for his talents on YouTube and at parks across the country, Friga wants people to know that he can play no matter what court or what level he’s at.
“To the people that actually care about me as a player and a creator, I want them to know that the person they see on YouTube is not going to be the same person they see on ESPN. I am going to be playing real basketball and I want to prove to my fans and followers that I belong at this stage.”
“I want to use TBT to show that I am worth more on the basketball court than just the camera time.”