St. Andrews alumnus earns coaching opportunity with NBA team

Jul. 8—PORTLAND Ore. — Gilbert Abraham hasn't been to his home in Laurinburg for nearly eight months. It's not because he hasn't wanted to, though.

Abraham, a St. Andrews University class of 2004 alumnus, had been serving as an assistant coach since November 2022 for the Austin Spurs, the NBA G League affiliate of the San Antonio Spurs. He recently made the jump from the minor league level to the NBA, after being hired as the new player development coach for the Portland Trail Blazers in June.

"I am grateful," Abraham said. "For the people that know me and have been on this journey with me, it is a special thing. I didn't play in the NBA, didn't have probably the most illustrious playing career; I've gotten everything, as the kids would say, out of the mud. It was a very humbling experience and honestly, for me, it's the greatest testament to all the people that have allowed me to work with them, and allow me to help them. It just means so much from that perspective."

While Abraham's only been around the NBA for a few months, he's worked with NBA players long before that. One of those players includes former North Carolina and NBA point guard Raymond Felton.

Felton helped get the word out to players at North Carolina about Abraham, which helped kick-start his career as a trainer.

"Everything kind of spread at UNC," Abraham said. "I ended up training a few of those players. Most notably, that (2017) championship season that they had with Justin Jackson, Isaiah Hicks, and Nate Britt, I was their skills development coach; I was working with them on the side throughout the season. And, then, also I was working with them throughout their pre-draft process."

How Abraham became invested in what he does goes back to his roots in Scotland County, however.

He played basketball throughout his four years at St. Andrews, and after he graduated, attended the University of North Carolina at Pembroke to get his master's degree in Public Administration. While he was there, Abraham worked as a reporter for the Laurinburg Exchange before becoming a teacher at Scotland High School. Through teaching, he discovered how much basketball meant to his community, but how hard it was for kids to find courts to play on.

It led to him creating an Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) basketball program called Scotland Warriors Achieving Triumph (SWAT).

"A lot of those kids ended up going on and playing in college, they got scholarships to play, or it just gave them an outlet," Abraham said. "The first year, we were bad. The following year, I ended up learning, like okay, these kids need training, they need skill development. So, at the time, there were several local churches who helped and gave me their church vans and things like that.

"I just started picking up the kids at like five o'clock in the morning and bringing them to the Laurel Hill gym or to Scotland High School at the time and we would just do workouts. And I didn't know it was an industry. At the time, I was just trying to get my players better. The following year, we were so good that we had won our region. We just didn't have enough money to do nationals and things like that. I was really proud of the stuff I did with that group."

The impact Abraham left on his players is still felt today. Xavier Bines, one of Abraham's former AAU players, said the opportunity for Abraham to coach in the NBA is something he "deserves."

"I'm extremely excited for him," Bines said. "I was there at the beginning of his journey so it's really special to see him getting what he deserves. He made a lot of sacrifices for us back then so to see him doing what he loves at the highest level is really unbelievable."

Abraham ended up coaching at Scotland High for a short time, and after graduating from UNCP in 2009, became an assistant basketball coach for Fayetteville State University until 2011. He returned to Scotland County and went back into teaching, only this time at Carver Middle School. Abraham never stopped training players, however; just a month after starting at Carver Middle, Abraham began training Felton.

What Abraham also accomplished in 2011 was starting up his own skill development company known as 'Akin Athletics.'

"I ended up partnering a lot with Raymond Felton's AAU team, with David West's team in Raleigh, and for about six or seven years, I was driving basically in a circle between Red Springs, Raleigh, and Greensboro," Abraham said. "I would have a group I would train in Red Springs and all of those kids I was training in Red Springs could've ended up in the Big East or the AAC (American Athletic Conference)."

Some of the players that Abraham trained throughout the three cities include former Duke and Michigan forward Joey Baker, former North Carolina State and Butler forward Manny Bates, former Providence and N.C. State forward Greg Gantt, current Pittsburgh guard K.J. Marshall, and former Virginia Military Institute, UNCP, and Milwaukee guard Jordan Ratliffe.

On top of running his own company, Abraham was the National Director of Skill Development and Regional Director for Big Shots, an exposure basketball event company, and the director of Point Guard College (PGC) Basketball, a skill development company for point guards.

It was at one of the PGC Basketball camps in 2016 where a father and son from the Czech Republic that visited the U.S. to train with Abraham would change his life.

"They invited me to the Czech Republic as a consultant," Abraham said. "While they were visiting, they basically fell in love with what I was doing. So, I went over there for about three months. And, then, what happened was we (the Jindrichuv Hradec Lions) ended up winning our championships there with the addition of me as a consultant, and then we won the first division men's league there."

Because of the success that Abraham had with the club, the Lions decided to make him an offer to become their Skill Development Director and Vice President of Operations in 2019, which Abraham accepted. Then, in 2021, the club decided to name Abraham their new head coach. Abraham coached the team for a year before leaving for his former job with the Spurs.

Abraham also accepted a position with Tandem Sports and Entertainment in 2021 as their Director of Performance.

"This is the agent, Jim Tanner, who represents Tim Duncan, Grant Hill, Ray Allen, Ja Morant, Jeremy Sochan, and most recently, Sidy Cissoko, James Nnaji; these are guys who got drafted this year," Abraham said on Tandem Sports and Entertainment. "With my work with that group, I was able to prepare and work with a plethora of NBA players, future NBA players, and European, overseas players, as well."

Abraham said he worked with "well over 30 players" throughout his time with Tandem Sports and Entertainment and even worked with the company throughout last season with the Spurs, before resigning from his position there in June.

Now that he's coaching skill development at the highest level in basketball, it seems as if there's little left for Abraham to accomplish in his career.

It's the opposite to him, however.

"I don't want to be just good; I want to be great," Abraham said. "First, I need to learn how they (Portland) want to do things, and secondly, I just want to add value. I want to make sure I honor those folks that have helped put me in this position."