Hwang Intae made sports history by becoming the first Korean referee to officiate a regular-season National Basketball Association (NBA) game.

In the early parts of 2020, Hwang moved to New Jersey, USA, after accepting an invitation to the NBA referee development program, which trains officials for the NBA, WNBA, and G League. Hwang moved 7,000 miles from South Korea with his wife, Heejung Kang, and their two children to Fort Lee, New Jersey to achieve his dream.

Here is an excerpt from Ben Golliver’s NBA Post Up weekly newsletter:

"Intae Hwang discovered basketball because the soccer field at his middle school in Masan, South Korea, was oversaturated with his classmates, who clustered in front of the goal hoping to get a kick in edgewise. A single hoop, tucked away in a corner across campus, commanded much less attention.

This was 1993, four years before the Korean Basketball League was founded and before NBA games were readily available on television in his small hometown. Though he could barely muster the strength to fling the ball over the rim, he kept at it.

While a freshman at Busan University of Foreign Studies, he tried and failed to dunk at halftime of an amateur game against a rival college. Kirok Shin, a senior, scolded Hwang for the showy breach of decorum and decided to quiz him about basketball’s finer points: the length of the court, the circumference of the ball and the number of hooks on the rim for the net. Hwang flunked the impromptu test and realized he wanted to know everything he could about the game. Shin happened to be a local referee, and he helped inspire Hwang to pick up a whistle for the first time in 2004.

That glance across the schoolyard and the chance encounter with Shin put Hwang, 43, on the path to becoming the first NBA staff referee from outside North America."

After moving to the States, Hwang Intae was able to gain experience in the NBA's developmental league, the G League, during the 2021-2022 season.

He officiated 7 regular NBA season games in the previous season as a non-staff referee. In an interview with the AP news agency at that time, Referee Hwang expressed, "The NBA was just a dream for me. I never thought I would be officiating in the NBA; I had only watched it on TV." In just a short time, he has fulfilled his 'American Dream' by becoming a regular NBA referee.

Now, the NBA has promoted Hwang to become a full-time referee with Sha'Rae Mitchell.

NBA senior vice president for referee development and training Monty McCutchen said, "We are delighted to officially bring Intae and Sha'Rae onto our full-time staff. Their outstanding performance records have rightfully earned them the opportunity to officiate NBA games regularly."

Congratulations to Hwang Intae on achieving his goal.