Last month, when the U.S. State Department began urging American citizens to leave Ukraine, Jerome Randle’s phone started buzzing incessantly.
Friends and family in America would send Randle media reports detailing Russia’s extraordinary military buildup along its border with Ukraine. They then begged the Chicago native to pack up his belongings and return home before it was too late.
“At least 50 people must have hit me up,” Randle, 34, told Yahoo Sports. “They were all saying, ‘You need to get out of there.’”
For Randle and other Americans playing basketball in Ukraine this season, fleeing was rarely a simple decision.