Rapper J. Cole Signs With Canadian Elite Basketball League Team

The Grammy Award-winning rapper will play professionally for the second consecutive season.

Rapper J. Cole has signed a deal to play in the Canadian Elite Basketball League with the Scarborough Shooting Stars, the league announced on Thursday.

Cole will begin training camp with the team this week and the Shooting Stars’ first game will be on May 26. The rapper’s new stint in Canada marks his second consecutive year playing professionally.

BREAKING: @sss_cebl have signed 6’3 guard, @JColeNC. He last played professionally in @theBAL. #LetsBall #OurGame pic.twitter.com/se2kb1ExJJ

— CEBL (@CEBLeague) May 20, 2022

In 2021, Cole played with Rwanda’s Patriots BBC in the Basketball Africa League. The 37-year-old played in three games for the Patriots where he totaled five points, three assists and five rebounds coming off the bench in 45 minutes of action.

Cole played basketball at Sanford High School in North Carolina and was briefly a walk-on player at St. John’s. However, the Grammy Award-winning rapper made the decision to leave the program to focus on his music career and never played a Division I game. 

For the 2022 season, the CEBL expanded to 10 teams. The Shooting Stars became the league’s eighth team in August 2021 will begin its first season in a week.

The CEBL was founded in 2017 and began playing games in 2019 with six teams. Typically, the league plays 20 regular season games coupled with the playoffs and a Final Four-style championship.

The Edmonton Stingers have won the CEBL title in back-to-back years.