Indiana Pacers forward Pascal Siakam greets students at Gagetown School in Gagetown, N.B., last Wednesday.Chris Donovan/The Globe and Mail
Following on from his second career appearance in the NBA Finals, Indiana Pacers forward Pascal Siakam on Wednesday greeted students at Gagetown School in Gagetown, N.B., who are participants in Siakam’s Data Dunkers program. The program, which encourages exploration of NBA and WNBA statistics using coding and artificial intelligence, is administered by Siakam’s PS43 Foundation.
Later on, the former Toronto Raptors star was awarded an honorary degree from the University of New Brunswick in recognition of his philanthropic work, which includes establishing a $200,000 scholarship through UNB’s McKenna Institute for students from his home country of Cameroon to study in tech-related fields at the university.
Oklahoma City Thunder guard Luguentz Dort drives to the basket against Indiana Pacers forward Pascal Siakam during the second half of game seven of the 2025 NBA Finals at Paycom Center in June.Kyle Terada/Reuters
Siakam, who won the NBA title with the Raptors before being traded to Indiana last year, said it was important to continue to build on his family’s legacy in Canada. “I grew up here. It taught me everything, really,” he said. “It’s where I learned to be a man, I took my driver’s licence here, it feels like home. With me leaving it’s just always making sure we keep that connection and the roots with all the programs and the things that we’ve done. I just couldn’t see myself leaving that behind.”
Siakam said meeting former New Brunswick premier Frank McKenna was critical to his engagement with the province. “We are always looking for opportunities to expand outside of Toronto and when I heard there was a huge community of Cameroonians in New Brunswick it felt like this was kind of perfect to give back to my community but also to Canada,” he said.
Siakam added that it was important to him to engage with communities where his presence is unexpected. Gagetown, for example, is a rural village with a population under 1,000.
“It’s priceless the look that these kids have on their faces,” he said. “Being able to touch the lives of kids from different parts of the world is so special. We can go to places where the community doesn’t expect this kind of thing to happen.
“I think about myself as a young kid getting the chance to go to Basketball Without Borders in South Africa and seeing the NBA players. It gave me a whole new perspective as someone who wanted to play in the NBA. That’s what I’m hoping to do here also.”