KIEV, UKRAINE – D.J. Stephens didn’t spend Thanksgiving the way he expected.
Rather than celebrating the holiday with family and friends back in the United States, Stephens was on a 10-hour flight to Kiev, the capital of Ukraine, to join B.C. Budivelnyk, regularly one of the top teams in the Ukrainian SuperLeague.
The airline he flew on lost his luggage, but blips in traveling are nothing new for Stephens, who has played in Greece, Russia and Turkey in his young career.
However, that doesn’t mean he has grown content with the inconsistent lifestyle. Despite having far more air miles than the average 25-year-old, he’s not an entirely uncommon case of an American chasing the domestic dream of playing in the NBA from abroad.