It wasn’t the path to professional basketball Kojo Mensah envisioned.
The Brooklyn native struggled just to transfer from Siena to Duquesne after his sophomore season. Later that year, he was shot and he eventually decided to forgo his senior season and declare for the NBA Draft in 2008. Mensah wasn’t selected, was invited to veteran’s camps by the Knicks and Nets, but didn’t stick.
“If I could go back I would finish my senior year,” Mensah said. “I would have done what a lot of people do, which is do the camps and not sign with anybody and then go back to school. I would have done that instead of making a full commitment.”
It didn’t stop the 6-foot-1, 180-pound former Bishop Loughlin guard from finding a place to play, though. He spent a year in Japan, before landing in Venezuela. He just finished a two-year deal with Panteras de Miranda in the Venezuela-LPB. He averaged more than 16 points and five assists per contest.
“I took the opportunity to go overseas,” Mensah, who led the CHSAA in scoring as a senior, said. “Your dream is to go to the NBA, but the contract from Venezuela came along I just took that one. Everything is going well now.”
That wasn’t always the case.
Mensah had a stellar sophomore season at Siena under then coach Rob Lanier, averaging 16.6 points per game. When Lanier was fired and Fran McCaffery took over, Mensah eventually felt the need to leave the Loudonville, NY school. Siena, however, initially held up releasing him from his National Letter of Intent, citing that mentor and adviser Norm Ostrin persuaded him to go to Duquesne to play with a former Notre Dame Prep teammate.
That fall he and four teammates were shot leaving a school dance. Mensah was shot in the left arm and sustained two broken bones. Two years later, he and teammate Shawn James sued the school for failing to properly prevent the act from occurring, saying that it hurt their ability to get drafted.
During the 2007-08 campaign, he started 13 games, averaged 12.1 points per game and 3.4 assists to help Duquesne go 17-13. Mensah chose not to come back for his senior season, declared for the draft and hired an agent, but was not picked. He was a borderline pick at the time, but had some people were telling him otherwise.
“It’s a risky situation,” Mensah, who eventually completed his degree in corporate communications, said. “Its’ you either take that step or you go back. Once you take that step, there is no turning back.”
Back is where he was he was Monday night at Dyckman Park in The Bronx. Mensah said it was three years since he played in the streetball atmosphere. Playing for JTA, he showed off his ability to attack the basket and knock down the open jumper in a win over the Harlem Ballers.
“I haven’t pulled out these kinds of moves in a long time,” he said.
While his handle can still shake defenders, he is still trying to shed the knock that has followed him since he was an All-City performer at Loughlin. Mensah has always been a scorer, but during the draft process and looking overseas people always asked if he can run a team and get others involved. He drove and dished to perfection Monday.
“We all know what he can do and he’s proved it time and time again,” said neighborhood friend Delroy James, who just finished his senior season at Rhode Island said. “He showed himself there. Now he’s come back home to show himself here.”
Mensah is hoping to get a change to try out for an NBA team this summer, but the impending lockout could make the difficult. If not, he will look back overseas. Whatever the outcome, he’s come a long way and persevered from plenty.
“The way he works I can see it definitely happening,” James said of Mensah making the NBA. “If it doesn’t he will still be a successful story, just because of what he is doing now.”