Andrei Kirilenko Becomes US Citizen

Andrei Kirilenko isn't making a big deal about it -- he didn't even tell his coach, Jerry Sloan -- but the Russian forward became a U.S. citizen on Monday.

Kirilenko and his wife Masha passed their immigration tests, and were sworn as American citizens at the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Office, according to the Desert News.

Drafted by the Jazz in 1999, Kirilenko has spent his entire 10-year career in Utah after coming over for the 2001-02 NBA season. Talking to reporters on Tuesday, he said "it was time" to become a U.S. citizen. He and his wife have two sons who are already have citizenship having been born in the U.S., and they adopted a daughter from Russia who Kirilenko said will eventually get citizenship, too.

For those curious about the test, Kirilenko said it was tough, but that he was well prepared. More on that from the Deseret News:

"I know for some guys it's kind of trouble, but it wasn't a very hard test," [Kirilenko] said.

And what was the toughest question for Kirilenko? After thinking for a minute, he replied, "Why the colonists didn't like Great Britain. It was taxation without representation. I said everyone wanted freedom."

Among the other questions, were "How many amendments to the Constitution?" "Which territory was given to the U.S. from France?" and "Who is the vice president?

"I knew it was (Joe) Biden, but I was ready for who is the third in charge," he said, referring to the speaker of the House.

How many amendments to the Constitution? It would be interesting to see what percentage of natural born U.S. citizens could answer that one.

The other obvious question? How are fellow comrades Alex Ovechkin and Semyon Varlamov taking the news.