The Most Interesting Man in College Basketball
Dom Palumbo
You’ve witnessed the high-flying dunks. You’ve witnessed the ferocious blocks that make their way to the fifth row of Thompson-Boling Arena.
But even without his prowess on the basketball court, Tennessee senior Yves Pons may still be the most interesting man in the world.
Here’s 11 things you didn’t know about Rocky Top's very own Renaissance man.
1. He was adopted when he was four and a half.
UT’s primary rim protector was raised in Fuveau, France—a small commune in the southeast portion of the country. But Yves’ birth nation is the small, yet resilient Caribbean island country of Haiti.
“I was born in Haiti, where I spent three and a half years with my biological mom. I was born in Port-au-Prince, which is the capital, but my hometown was Cité Soleil. It’s one of the biggest areas in Haiti and is also the poorest part of Haiti. I spent three years over there. I don’t remember much, I just know I was there. Then my mom, by law, had to send me to the orphanage because she couldn’t take care of me, and I was pretty sick at the time.”
After close to a year in the orphanage, Yves was taken in by his adopted parents, Babeth and Jean-Claude Pons, who lived in France.
2. Yves got his bounce from … jazz dance.
Yes. Jazz dance. Yves’ adopted mother, Babeth, was a well-known jazz dancer and instructor in France and introduced him to the performing arts.
“My mom was a professional dancer. She did jazz dance, and in her area, my mom was like the Michael Jordan of jazz dance. Everywhere she went, everyone knew her. She had her dance studio, where she was teaching professional dancers. So she was up there in terms of jazz dancers.
“Anyway, she found me a studio with one of her students, and I started to do dance over there. I was really flexible, and I started to do shows with a stage and music and a crowd and everything. I really enjoyed it. I did, I want to say, five years of it, and it was a lot of fun. I did all of this from age six to 11.”
Not only was he skilled at it, but the time he spent dancing helped elevate his game on the basketball court in more ways than one.
“I think dance helped me to get the bounce that I have today. My mom was 100 percent a dancer, and dancers jump really high and their verticals are crazy. If you measured it, they would get like a 45-inch vertical or something, and that’s how we practiced. You train your body differently, and I was using this stuff instinctively on the basketball court. I think that’s how I separated myself from other guys, because I was doing different things.”
3. His grandfather, Yves, introduced him to music, and his mom bought him his first saxophone.
“My (adopted) grandfather's name is Yves. It’s funny that I’m adopted and my grandad is named Yves, too. He’s a musician, and he was the head of an orchestra. He played music, and he played the saxophone, the guitar—he played all different instruments and I can’t even say all of them. He was doing tours around France. He had his own crew and everything, and he was really well known, too. Now, he’s almost 89, and he’s still playing and he’s still doing concerts for small numbers of people.”
Yves' grandfather inspired him to get into music. While there is now video evidence of Yves’ skills on the saxophone, that wasn’t the first instrument he wanted to try in his younger years.
just an absolute force of nature pic.twitter.com/ZHCtGmr7Ji
— Tennessee Basketball (@Vol_Hoops) May 23, 2020
“The interest started when I saw my grandad playing music. So I said, ‘I want to play the trumpet.’ I asked my mom, and I don’t remember why she said no, but she just said, ‘Why don’t you try the saxophone?’ So we bought a saxophone, and she told me that if I want to do the saxophone, judo and basketball, then I would have to stick with it. She said if I didn’t, then I would just be over it in like two months.”
He stuck with it for more than three years, taking private lessons and playing for a short time in school, learning to play multiple musical styles.
4. His introduction to sports was “random.”
“When I got to France, I had no idea what a sport was. So for me, getting into sport was really random. No one in my family played any sport, but I was pretty tall for my age, and a lot of people would tell me that I’m tall and that I should play basketball. I was like, ‘What the hell is basketball?’ So I would just say, ‘Oh, ok, thank you,’ because I had no idea what basketball was.
“All of those people told me that I should be playing basketball. There was a club next to my house that was about a two-minute walk away. One day when I came back from school, I said, ‘Mom, all of these people are telling me that I should be playing basketball, and I want to try it.’ Then she said, ‘Okay, we’re going to try it. There’s a club right here. We’ll put your name in and see what happens.’
As it turns out, quite a bit would happen. Yves showed promise as a youth player in his hometown, eventually earning himself a spot at the renowned INSEP Academy in Paris—a physical education institution that molded well known NBA standouts such as Boris Diaw, Ronny Turiaf and Tony Parker.
5. Yves has“Happy Feet."
Along with jazz dance, Yves’ mother introduced him to clap dance. In America, clap dance is known by the term “step dance,” which is using the sound of one’s feet and hands to create an authentic beat, while dancing to a style of music. This dancing was popularized in the famous children’s movie, Happy Feet.
“(Clap dance) was one of the first things I got into before everything else. My mom had her own studio for dance, and at the same time she was doing jazz dance, she was also doing some clap dance. I was a part of the clap dance group with a couple of girls and two other guys. I was like five or six when I started. I picked it up quick and I really liked it. I was dancing with a jazz rhythm and music in the background.
“That was really fun. We did some different shows when I was really young. Being on the stage was really fun and was my favorite part of it. Being on stage with people around was really, really nice. I kept it going for a few years. We had a small crew with all of my mom’s female students who were all older. They were all around 40 to 50 years old, and I was the youngest one every time. We would get together every Wednesday and train for our end-of-year show. We would make a new choreography every year with my mom, and it was a lot of fun. We would have different types of shows with costumes every year.”
The dancing, like everything else, played a small role in him becoming the hooper he is today.
“I think it helped with my rhythm and my coordination. I had to learn to use both of my feet, and that’s where I think it really helped me a lot. You also learn to use your body in different ways. I think it helps with your lower body and your calves and stuff, because we’re still jumping in these shoes. So, I think it really helped to develop my lower body.”
6. He also was a young judo prodigy.
Hooping, jazz dance, the saxophone … and a devastating roundhouse kick.
Yves also showed promise as a judo fighter in Fuveau, earning comparisons to arguably the world’s greatest fighter.
“At the time I was doing all these other activities, I was also doing judo. I was doing all of that together. My judo teacher was really serious about me doing judo and had me in competitions, and I was pretty good. I was winning a lot, and I was a champion in my area a few times. He was always comparing me to Teddy Riner, who was a 10-time World Champion and has two Olympic gold medals. He’s the greatest judo fighter in the world. And my coach was comparing me to him."
“Every day, he was doing presentations of me to other people, showing people what I was doing, how great I was, what I won and all of those things. He was always complimentary of me because he liked me and he thought I could be really good.”
Yves gave up judo when he was 11 years old to focus on basketball, but who knows what kind of judo master he could have become had he wholeheartedly pursued it.
7. Yves is the most photogenic Vol … even from the other side of the camera.
If you haven't checked it out, take a look at Pons Cam, Yves’ personal Instagram account dedicated to showcasing his ability behind the camera. His love affair with photography started long before he even knew college basketball could be a possibility.
“I had always loved to take pictures. Even when I was six or seven years old, I loved the cameras where you could only take like 10 pictures. I always had one of those in my pocket and took pictures of everything.
“Then, I really got into it when I was about 12 years old, right before I left to go to INSEP. I had a compact bridge camera from Canon, and I would take pictures of these events my town held for little kids with one of my best friends from home, Léna Lopez. She had a reflex Canon camera.
“At one point, she asked me if I wanted to try her camera, and it felt so good. The quality of it, the pixels and everything were way better than mine. And the pictures were amazing. I was like, ‘Man, I want this same one.’ I was jealous. I kept her camera for the entire event.”
8. They see him rollin … they hatin?
If you ever find yourself on campus on a non-gameday, you just might catch a glimpse of our most-interesting-man rolling through campus on his scooter.
“I got it my freshman year, right after I got here. The campus for me was way too big to walk around, especially my freshman year when I had classes downtown. I was taking English classes and other Gen-Eds, so I was either walking downtown or taking the trolley.
“I didn’t want to have to keep doing that. I found a bike, but a bike wasn’t really that convenient. Then I saw a scooter. I decided I was going to get a scooter and not have to walk around and ride my scooter around to classes. So, I got my scooter even before those pay-per-use scooters got here. I got my own scooter and was the only one who had one.”
When he first got it, it was a normal black electric scooter. This year, it’s sporting a fresh, new look that brings to mind images of Trinidad Jame$ in his popular music video, All Gold Everything.
“My wife and I bought some spray paint and we had some left and my wife suggested we paint the scooter. I said, ‘In gold?’ She said, ‘Yeah, it will be fun.’ So, we just spray painted it, and it honestly turned out pretty good.”
His scooter has become a part of his persona on campus and inside the locker room at Thompson-Boling Arena.
“The guys love seeing me on the scooter. I’m not walking around campus anymore, so if they see someone on a scooter, they might think that’s me. I also have some funny stories of me falling off the scooter and everything, so people might try to send me jokes and stuff about it.
“It has really become a part of me. Because after a practice, you don’t want to walk. So, for me to be flying on my scooter and staying off my feet is a good thing.”
9. Yves left home at 13 to pursue his hoops dreams.
At 13 years old, after showing significant potential as a basketball player, Pons left his home in Fuveau for the first time to journey to the INSEP Academy in France. He was once again required to adjust to a new life and grow up a bit quicker than most.
“Going to Paris to play basketball was tough, so I had to adapt again. But I’m someone who can adapt anywhere now. I had to take care of myself, pay for my meals and go out and pay attention to everything going on over there. I had to be a grown man, and I was only 13 years old. So that really helped me to grow as a man and change both my mind and my vision to how I approach things.”
He competed for his home country at the U-15 and U-16 European Championships and the U-17 FIBA World Championships, where his recruiting stock rapidly took flight.
Before he knew it, he was on his way to America to suit up for the Tennessee Volunteers. Once again, he adapted to a new environment.
“When I came here, I had to adapt again. It was a new language, a new environment, a new country and a much different culture. But it was a good challenge for me. People were asking me if I was scared or skeptical of coming here with a new language and life and everything. And I was like, ‘No, let’s do it. I’ll adapt and figure it out, and this will be a good challenge for me. I’ll find out when I get there.’
"When you’re young, it only takes you six months to a year to get used to a new language. So I knew that for six months it would be hard, but then I would be good. And that’s what happened. I had to learn the language every day. I had headaches from hearing English, but it was a good experience.”
He conquered every barrier that comes with moving to a new country, and has been HOOPING for the Orange & White ever since.
10. He tied the knot early.
Sorry, ladies. Yves is indeed a happily married man.
He and his wife, Laetitia, recently celebrated their two-year wedding anniversary and are going strong. The story of how the couple met is an interesting one.
“We met in a weird way. She was doing an exchange in New York. She was finishing her master’s degree in fashion marketing. At the same time, my friend Frank Ntilikina played for the New York Knicks, and my mentor, Raphael Gaston, went with me to some games. After a game, we followed Frank to see what his life looked like. He went out, so we went out after the game. A friend of his called some friends over, and Laetitia was in that group and we met like that.
“We started talking. At first, she didn’t want to date me because I was too young for her. I was 18 during my freshman year, and she was 22. When I told her my age, she didn’t think I was for her. But we spent the whole night together just talking.
“When I got back to Knoxville, we just kept talking. I asked her to come visit Knoxville so we could spend time together. That was when we really started to date. We went to Nashville, and it was really nice. We got married about two months later in the summer of my freshman year. It was pretty quick, but I was in love and I know what I want. I met her, and that was it for me.”
11. “Only dumb people get bored.”
For many, the quarantine period of the COVID-19 pandemic earlier this year was a challenging and sudden change of pace. For Yves and Laetitia, it was an opportunity to grow as a couple and rediscover a number of old talents and hobbies.
“We got to be much closer, and we got to know each other even better. I think we adjusted even more to the little things together. It was really nice. We had the time to do all of the things we didn’t have the time to do during the season. Not going out, because we don’t go out. We watched movies, played tennis or just went on walks. It was a lot of fun."
“With no basketball, I’m not the kind of guy who has nothing to do, and I never get bored. Laetitia and I have this code from her dad, who says, ‘Only dumb people get bored.’ And it’s the truth. I mean, if you get bored, it means you’re not smart enough to figure out something to do, because there’s always something to do. We’re never just sitting on the couch watching TV with nothing to do. If I’m not taking pictures, I’m cooking. If I’m not cooking, I’m reading a book, going out, or working out and training somewhere. I’m always trying to figure out something to do… talking to family and getting closer to them and taking advantage of this time to do something you wouldn’t normally have time to do. That was the biggest adjustment. And it was really nice, because I took the time to do the things I normally wouldn’t do.”
During quarantine, Yves continued to grow his photography Instagram account. He found a renewed passion to get back into the kitchen, creating a cooking account on the same platform and appearing on Instagram live for UT’s international students, leading a class on how to make a French specialty: crepes.
Editor's Note
On Sunday, Oct. 25th from 5-7 p.m. ET, Yves will be conducting a virtual cooking class over Zoom, with all proceeds donated to Make-A-Wish East Tennessee. The Frenchman will be preparing a classic French dish and dessert.
Tickets for the event are $50 and reservations can be made at the event link below.
