STONY BROOK, N.Y. — The latest addition to the Stony Brook men's basketball team has experience competing with professional players in Japan.
Kaine Roberts, 18, has signed with the Seawolves for the 2021-22 season.
Roberts, a 6-foot-2 guard, has spent this past season with Japanese B League pro team Earthfriends.
He signed with that organization last August, and declined a take a salary in order to maintain his amateurism for an eventual collegiate career in the United States.
Five years younger than any of his teammates, Roberts played alongside professional players this season including Nnanna Egwu, a former University of Illinois standout who holds that program's record for blocks.
Roberts was born in Kanagawa Prefecture, a coastal area south of Tokyo, and primarily was raised in Tokyo. His father Riley is an American who served in the Navy in Japan and his mother Kazue Daita is Japanese.
Roberts previously was a member of the Asia-Pacific select squad at the U-16 All-Star game. He competed against Europeans teens at the EuroLeague Final Four week in Spain during that event.
He received the GRIT award for his hard work during the NBA-hosted Basketball Without Borders Asia camp in Tokyo in 2019.
"Kaine is a dynamic playmaker, who is a hard worker with tremendous character," Stony Brook coach Geno Ford said. "His experiences playing both high-level high school basketball in the States, and this past season in the Pro B league in Japan, have prepared him to be a good player in our league. We are thrilled to get him here and start working."
Roberts became a trailblazer in maintaining his amateurism while playing in a Japanese professional league.
"It's big that we've found a way to let a player compete in a pro league and then go to the NCAA," Earthfriends head coach Shunsuke Todo said last summer, during the signing ceremony, according to The Japan Times. "I'm proud of this announcement, because this is very epoch-making for both the B League and Japanese basketball. … I think we can present a new path for other young Japanese players."
Roberts joins a standout incoming class that includes returning Elijah Olaniyi and fellow transfers Jahlil Jenkins from Fairleigh Dickinson and Anthony Roberts from St. Bonaventure.
