The hit basketball anime "Kuroko's Basketball" teamed up with NBA for releasing original goods and merchandise based on its upcoming film "Kuroko's Basketball The Movie: Last Game". The author of the original manga series, Tadatoshi Fujimaki handpicked 8 out the 30 NBA teams for the collaboration. Characters of the anime will be portrayed sporting the NBA uniforms of the selected teams.
The collaboration started off last February 1 where the anime's character designer, Yoko Kikuchi drew Seirin's ace player, Taiga Kagami in a Chicago Bulls uniform. Just like in his Seirin uniform, the Chicago Bulls jersey version was shown to have number 010. It is possible that Fujimaki took reference to the team's retired jersey of the same number belonging to Bob Love.
The next that was shown in his NBA uniform is Shintaro Midorima which definitely found a perfect match for his hair in Boston Celtics. He sports a 006 Celtic uniform which historically belonged to the legendary Bill Russell.
Following Midorima is the titular character Tetsuya Kuroko signing up for the San Antonio Spurs. He lived up with his name as the Phantom member by wearing the Black Spurs uniform which matches his black armbands. He wears his previous jersey number 011 just like in the anime.
Next to sign up was the leader of the Generation of Miracles, Seijuro Akashi wearing the Los Angeles Lakers jersey number 004. Followed by Ryota Kise going to the Golden State Warriors. The blue and yellow color schemes of the team match perfectly his golden blonde hair and his previous 007 Kaijo uniform.
Atsuhi Murasakibara headed towards Phoenix Suns with 009 while the power forward Daiki Aomine was picked to go to Cleveland Cavaliers with number 005 as reported by Crunchyroll. Fujimaki set Aomine to go to the champion Cavs because of his uncanny resemblance to the star player LeBron James in terms of offense and defense abilities.
To complete the list "Kuroko's Basketball" staff selected New York Knicks for the final character. The list seemed complete because all of the major characters including the Generation of Miracles have already signed up their respective teams. However, Anime News Network revealed that the final character is Kagami's best friend Tatsuya Himuro from Yosen.
Fujimaki put Himuro on the Knicks because of his American roots where he lived during his childhood days. Himuro and New York Knicks made up the initial 8 teams for the collaboration. However, considering the large fan base of the anime, we can see the collaboration to extend to more characters.
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