Dikembe Mutombo’s reach was always destined to be global, canvassing far more of the world than the paint he patrolled for 18 seasons in the NBA.

From the moment he was drafted by the Denver Nuggets with the fourth overall pick in June of 1991, Mutombo had designs on something greater. Somehow, he’d give back to his native Democratic Republic of Congo, or honor his parents, who harnessed in him a love for science, or teach a younger generation how to tend to future ones.

Maybe, with his irrepressible energy and his infectious personality, he’d accomplish them all.

“There’s an old proverb from the African continent that says that when you take the elevator to go up, you always got to make sure that you send the elevator down so it can take the other people,” Mutombo told The Post in a wide-ranging interview this week. “My way of sending the elevator down was go back home and try to see how many lives can I touch.”

Mutombo bellows his deep, hearty laugh when he thinks about the number of organizations and boards he’s affiliated with. There’s the CDC, UNICEF, Special Olympics, Basketball Without Borders and his role as the NBA’s first global ambassador. That’s in addition to the Dikembe Mutombo Foundation, which was founded in 1997 and built the Biamba Marie Mutombo hospital in honor of his late mother a decade later. A K-12 school, dedicated to his father and focused on science and entrepreneurship, is scheduled to open next year near Kinshasa, the capital of the DRC.

Even though Mutombo’s native DRC hasn’t been crushed by COVID-19 cases (69 deaths as of Friday), he brims with excitement that his foundation is helping to feed frontline workers and taking on other local initiatives.

“We serve lunch and dinner to four hospitals with more than 80 doctors and nurses, which was great,” he said. “I’m glad that we took those initiatives. In the Congo, right now, we are launching a local mask production, so where we are making masks, we are asking people to start making masks at the foundation headquarters.”

At his hospital, there are handwashing stations every 20 meters. He beams that every doctor, nurse, patient or family member is given a mask for free upon entering. As a global citizen, and one who feels a moral obligation to address health concerns for those in need, Mutombo can’t ignore a health crisis when he knows he’s in position to help.

“One of the doctors says when there’s a problem affecting one part of the community, it should be a responsibility of every human being living on the planet,” Mutombo said. “… If we didn’t think that this great epidemic that affects all of us was just a Chinese problem and we didn’t think it was our problem, that’d mean we were wrong because we knew that we didn’t participate or if we didn’t take enough steps, this epidemic would ravage our community globally.”

John Leyba, The Denver PostFormer Denver Nuggets star Dikembe Mutombo poses with his family in front of his banner during his jersey retirement ceremony at halftime of the Denver Nuggets Portland Trail Blazers game October 30, 2016 at Pepsi Center.

Mutombo, who planned to become a doctor when he enrolled at Georgetown, knows that his accomplishments wouldn’t have been possible without basketball, without the platform the game provided him. For that, he thanks his mentors like Bill Russell, Patrick Ewing and legendary Hoyas coach John Thompson.

And though he’s just as comfortable discussing global catastrophes as he is reflecting on his storied Hall of Fame career, his tone changes when asked about his favorite memories from the five seasons he spent in Denver. Inevitably, he brings up the Nuggets’ improbable first-round upset of the No. 1 seed Seattle SuperSonics in 1994, however, that’s not where his mind goes first.

“I was welcomed to the city like an angel,” Mutombo said. “Like ‘OK, you’re the one who we were looking for.’”

The Nuggets had been rudderless after Doug Moe’s sterling run throughout the ’80s. Mutombo gave the Nuggets an imposing, finger-wagging, defensive identity.

“(I appreciate) so much that that organization made me the face of the team and the face of the city and it made me their franchise player,” he said. “… I gave that beautiful city almost everything they ask of me.”

In turn, they gave him an enduring nickname befitting a man of his stature: Mt. Mutombo.

“I don’t know if I’d gone to some city that is very flat, like other cities in America where there’s no mountains, would they have called me Mt. Mutombo?” he joked. “You cannot forget where you were born. It’s because of the city of Denver that Mt. Mutombo was born. I think Dikembe Mutombo’s career was born with the Denver Nuggets.”

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And from there his legend flourished, an iconic defensive player with an even bigger appetite for helping others.

Dan Issel, the coach when the Nuggets sprung their incredible first-round upset over Seattle, may have said it best during Mutombo’s jersey retirement in 2016.

“This man has given more for the game of basketball than the game of basketball ever gave him,” Issel said.

Now, even in retirement, Mutombo refuses to stop playing defense.

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