UConn center makes waves

STORRS, Conn. – Hasheem Thabeet smiles at the misconceptions he’s heard about himself.

Connecticut’s 7-foot-3 freshman center is from Tanzania, but he did not grow up with lions in the African bush. Yes, he had seen a basketball before coming to the United States.

The 19-year-old Thabeet describes himself as a middle-class big-city kid from Dar es Salaam, which has a population of 2.5 million. He played soccer and other sports while growing up, and has played organized basketball for about four years.

Now he’s starting for the No. 18 Huskies, averaging more than four blocked shots, seven points and seven rebounds per game. His coaches say Thabeet could become one of the best big men to come out of Connecticut, which has produced Cliff Robinson, Donyell Marshall and Emeka Okafor.

Thabeet was playing for a Tanzanian club team at a tournament in Kenya when he began hearing about opportunities to come to the United States.

He used a computer at his school to contact coaches at prep schools in the United States, hoping to use basketball as an avenue to get an education and ease the financial strain on his widowed mother, Rukia Manka, a businesswoman with two younger children – a son, Akbar, and a daughter, Shan.

He has been on his own since.

Thabeet said he had hoped to get good enough to play for a Division II or Division III school. He never dreamed a school like UConn would be interested, and was thrilled to get the scholarship offer.