French Revolution: Victor Wembanyama, the 2024 Olympics and the 'huge boom' that could be coming

The 20-year-old wonder may have left France, but he hasn't left France behind

Marcel-Cerdan Sports Palace was not built for a player like Victor Wembanyama. Last season, when Wembanyama played his home games in Levallois-Perret, a northwestern suburb of Paris, he had to duck his head to get around. Reporters packed into a tiny press room. Tickets were virtually impossible to come by. A longtime employee snuck people in.

The arena is more than 30 years old and seats 2,800 people. "It looks more like a big gym than a true arena, to be honest," Yann Ohnona, a writer for French sports newspaper L'Equipe and the author of "Wembanyama: The making of an NBA star," said. Wembanyama's early-season games with Metropolitans 92 sold out, and, after the team returned home from a pair of exhibition games in Las Vegas, where the 7-foot-4 phenom dazzled against the G League Ignite, everybody wanted to be there.

"We were all shocked," Rémi Reverchon, an analyst for beIN Sports in France, said. "Like, what the f--- is Michael Douglas doing at a Metropolitans 92 game, you know?"