SALT LAKE CITY -- Shaka Browne and Lytel Martin had the exact same regular growing up. They would go to NBA 2K MT Coins college. They'd come home. They had pop-in NBA 2K9 -- the 2009 variant of the NBA-based video game -- and could ball online. Five-on-five digital games. On the weekends, the same thing. Perform all weekend. Bucket after bucket. Come home, log in to NBA 2K and match. Again and again. Day after day. Weekend after weekend.

It was a competitive time using hundreds of thousands competing on the web. Shaka, whose handle has been"YoungSparks92," watched someone climbing the ranks with him. "YoungKobe3." Both New Yorkers were connected together then. Little did they know that nearly a decade later they'd be competing side by side for the Utah Jazz in a professional league for NBA 2K players.

See, at the moment, it was all about positions. They climbed the ladder up. They jockeyed for position. Shaka had the bragging rights always ahead of Lotty. When Lotty discovered both NBA 2K stars climbed up in the same neighborhood of Mount Vernon, New York. He knew he had to battle him. 1 game to pick bragging rights to the town and 2K. They went to different high schools, so it was not like they could link up by themselves.

Shaka wanted the chance to play Lotty one . He always knew he was a better player than himeven if they had been constantly neck-and-neck in the competitive positions. He only wanted the moment to prove it. They played with a hard-fought game. Lotty chose the Los Angeles Lakers -- a group touting a prime Kobe Bryant -- and Shaka chose the Rockets, which had Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming at the time.

Later that night, both opponents -- who had never met until that point -- ended up going to the movies. Fast forward more than 10 years and the two are still side by side, teaming together on Jazz Gambling, the Utah Jazz affiliate for the NBA 2K League. "When we found out that we were from the exact same neighborhood and we were both on top of the planet, such as, wow, that is crazy we need to start hanging out and talking about the sport to kind of Cheap NBA 2K21 MT learn from each other," Shaka explained. "And then we only became teammates then."