Jennifer Hudson Breaks Silence Days After Being Smacked In the Face with a Basketball During NBA Game
Jennifer Hudson is opening up about her date night with Common when she got “knocked upside” the head with a basketball.
The EGOT winner was at the Madison Square Garden on March 4 with her rapper-boyfriend. The two were sitting courtside watching the New York Knicks play against the Golden State Warriors when suddenly a ball came flying toward her direction as Knicks player Miles McBride tried to save it from going out of bounds.
In a March 13 clip posted to the “Jennifer Hudson Show” YouTube page, Hudson gave her account of what happened to her audience on her talk show.
After confirming the ball did actually hit her, she stood up and moved closer to her audience. She said, “So I’m sitting there and then all of a sudden I’m having a conversation. Don’t have no conversation when you sitting courtside. First of all, so I’m looking this way and then all of a sudden I’m like why everybody looking crazy. And then BAM!”
Hudson said it happened, “So quick, right! So I’m like what the hell done popped me? Something must have hit me. Of all the people to hit, you hit Jennifer Hudson? Really?”
She then confirmed that “the ball actually did hit me,” in response to people still unclear on what happened.
“So I’m sitting there and then all of a sudden out of the blue something just hit me. And I was like ‘I don’t know what happened’ and then all of a sudden it’s people standing over me. They like ‘You OK? You OK?’ and I’m like ‘Hold on, let me just come to for a second. Let me just gather my thoughts,’” Hudson stated.
She explained that she got hit when McBride tried to save the ball. She noted that he was remorseful about the incident and “wanted to end the whole game.” “He was like ‘Oh my God. I done hit Jennifer, Lord.’ And I’m like ‘Baby, I’m OK go play your game,” the mother of one continued.
As the mom of 15-year-old David Daniel Otunga Jr., whom she welcomed with her ex-fiancé and former WWE star David Otunga, Hudson said she understands what can happen at a game due to accompanying her son and his friends to their basketball games.
She and Otunga Sr. got engaged after less than a year of dating but split up for good in 2017 after 10 years of dating.
Since 2023, the “Dreamgirls” star has been dating Common, who was sitting next to her when the ball came flying across her face.
Referencing the “Just Right” actor in the next part of her recollection, Hudson said, “And my sweet love was like ‘OK, you alright? Would you like to leave? And I’m like ‘I’m good, just let me sit here and gather myself,’ because the last thing you want to do is get up and go running somewhere. No, you need a moment.”
But that wasn’t “the sweetest part,” according to Hudson who then told producers to roll a clip of McBride speaking.
He shows up on the screen in the video saying, “Hey, Jennifer, it’s Miles ‘Deuce’ McBride here.’ Just wanted to say I’m sorry for running into you at our game last week. You know I was in the zone trying to make a play, trying to bring some energy, and unfortunately you were in the wrong place at the wrong time. So to say I’m sorry, I got you a little something. Hopefully we can be cool after this. I appreciate you showing support to us, and go, Knicks.”
The gift McBride gave her was a pink bouquet of roses which was given to her from someone on her team.
Fans responded to the incident on the “Entertainment Tonight” repost of the clip on Instagram.
One person said, “She doin too much brah. It was an accident.”
Another wrote, “omg drama .. sit in the stands next time . she over reacting.”
On her page one person said, “Good on Deuce for apologizing, making a cameo, and sending flowers.”
A fourth said, “Those roses are beautiful.”
Hudson later revealed that Knicks City dancers decided to do a spirit tunnel as she walked in for the game “before I got knocked upside the head,” similar to the spirit tunnel she creates for guests on her show. She added that she makes it a point to attend the All-Star Game every year in honor of her late brother Jason, who would have attended.
Jason Hudson is one of the three family members who were killed by William Balfour, the estranged husband of Jennifer’s sister, Julia, who was convicted of the crimes. Jason, along with their mother, Darnell Donerson, and her nephew, Julian King were found dead in a Chicago home in 2008.
