Road to Duke
Khaman Maluach was born on September 14, 2006, in Rumbek, a town in Lakes State, South Sudan — a region that had been devastated by decades of civil conflict. He does not remember the year his family left. “I actually don’t know the year I left South Sudan,” he told ESPN. “I don’t remember anything, moving to Uganda. All I know is that I grew up in Uganda.”
His family fled to Kawempe, a crowded suburb on the outskirts of Kampala, Uganda’s capital. His father, Madit Maluach, stayed behind in South Sudan for work. His mother — whose name has not been publicly shared — raised seven children alone in a community where opportunities were scarce and school fees were a burden the family could not consistently afford. Khaman went two years without attending school because his family could not pay the tuition.
He grew up loving soccer and supported Manchester United. Basketball was not in the picture. He had never touched a basketball until he was thirteen years old.
The discovery came in the most improbable way. Walking home from school one day in late 2019, a man on a boda boda — a motorcycle taxi — stopped in front of the tall teenager. “You should start playing basketball,” the man told him. “I can get you shoes, I can get you the ball.” Maluach took the offer. The nearest court was an hour’s walk from his home, often packed with players, and he played his first game wearing a pair of Crocs.
But local coaches Wal Deng and Aketch Wuoi Garang saw something in the raw, gangly kid almost immediately. “The first time I saw Khaman, I saw so much potential,” Deng told BBC Sport Africa. Garang arranged for Maluach to attend Bethel Covenant College in Bwebajja on a scholarship, solving the school fees problem that had kept him out of education. “I trusted Akech because he was a South Sudanese coach,” Maluach later explained. “He gave me a scholarship to go study at school. By then, school tuition was hard, so I took the scholarship and it motivated me. That’s how I got into the game.”
At home, Maluach and his brother devised their own training facility. They stacked two or three large tires on top of each other to create a rim at the proper height, and Khaman practiced his shots every day — one basketball, one tire rim, and limitless ambition. At night, the brothers ran what they called the “night shift”: at midnight, when Ugandan telecommunications companies dropped their mobile data prices, they would stay up watching YouTube clips of Giannis Antetokounmpo and Joel Embiid. “I used to see Giannis’ jab step, and then with Joel I learned the shimmy,” Maluach said. “If they can make it there, I can make it there too.”
In late 2019, Maluach attended a basketball camp organized by the Luol Deng Foundation. Deng — the former Duke star and NBA All-Star who is also of South Sudanese heritage — had founded the organization to use basketball as a tool for empowerment across Africa. For Maluach, the camp was the gateway. His talent and the positive reference from Deng earned him a spot at the NBA Academy Africa in Saly, Senegal, in 2021. He was the youngest player ever enrolled at the academy. He was fourteen years old, approximately 4,700 miles from home, and had been playing organized basketball for less than two years.
The academy combined world-class coaching with education and exposure to international competition. Maluach thrived but the separation from his family was immense. He hasn’t seen them in years, choosing to focus on basketball and education. “I left home at a very young age so I had to learn a lot of stuff,” he told CBS Sports. “I had to learn how to be a man off the basketball court. The academy helped me through all that.”
His rise was stunningly fast. In 2022, at fifteen, he played for South Sudan’s professional team Cobra Sport in the Basketball Africa League as part of the BAL Elevate program. He was named MVP of the 2023 Basketball Without Borders Africa camp in Johannesburg. In August 2023, at sixteen, he was selected for the South Sudan national team roster for the 2023 FIBA Basketball World Cup, becoming the third-youngest player ever to appear in a World Cup game when he debuted in a victory over China. South Sudan, led by Maluach and a roster of players who had grown up in refugee camps, finished as the best-ranked African team and qualified for the 2024 Paris Olympics.
In 2024, playing for the Ugandan club City Oilers in the BAL season, Maluach averaged 17.5 points, a league-leading 13.5 rebounds, and 2.8 blocks per game. He set the BAL single-game record with 7 blocks. At the 2024 Paris Olympics, he was the youngest player in the entire tournament. In a pre-Olympic exhibition game against Team USA, South Sudan — 43-point underdogs — led by one point with ten seconds remaining before LeBron James sealed it with a late layup. Maluach was seventeen years old, standing on a court against the greatest basketball players on earth, representing a nation younger than he was.
On March 6, 2024, Maluach committed to Duke over UCLA, Kentucky, and Kansas. He chose Duke in part because of the impression Zion Williamson had made on him watching from Africa. He wore #9 at Duke to honor Luol Deng — the man whose foundation camp had changed the trajectory of his life.
At Duke
Maluach arrived in Durham in the fall of 2024 as the #3 overall recruit in the nation and the top-ranked center in the class, joining a Duke roster that included fellow five-star freshmen Cooper Flagg (#1 overall) and Kon Knueppel (#7 overall) — the consensus #1 recruiting class in the country.
For someone who had been playing organized basketball for roughly five years, his adjustment to the ACC was remarkable. Maluach averaged 8.6 points, 6.6 rebounds, and 1.3 blocks in 21.3 minutes per game. He shot 71.2% from the field — an extraordinary efficiency mark driven by his rim-running, lob-finishing, and offensive rebounding. He also hit 77% of his free throws, suggesting the potential for an expanded shooting range as his career develops.
His defensive impact transcended statistics. At 7-foot-2 with a 7-foot-7 wingspan and 9-foot-6 reach, Maluach altered countless shots without recording blocks. He was the anchor of Duke’s interior defense, and when he was on the floor, opponents thought twice about attacking the rim. He earned ACC All-Freshman Team honors and received votes for ACC Defensive Player of the Year as a freshman.
Jon Scheyer, who had sent staffers to Africa to recruit Maluach personally, was effusive in his praise. “I wish you guys could see him every day in practice,” Scheyer told reporters. “He’s completely about the right things. He’s completely about the preparation, attention to detail. For only playing the game for four or five years, his feel is incredible to me.” He called Maluach “one of the best human beings” and “one-of-one” off the court.
Cooper Flagg, the projected #1 pick in the 2025 NBA Draft and Maluach’s teammate, described him in terms that had nothing to do with basketball: “Everything about him is so pure. Some people you can just tell their intentions and whether they are pure. Khaman is one of those people. He always has a positive aura about him and has a way of putting smiles on people’s faces.”
The nickname among teammates was “Man Man.” He spoke four languages. He prayed daily. He studied film obsessively. And in the NCAA Tournament, he elevated.
In five tournament games, Maluach shot 84% from the field (21-of-25), an absurd number for a freshman center in March. In the Sweet Sixteen win over Arizona, he had 4 blocks and helped form a defensive fortress alongside Flagg that held the Wildcats’ offense in check. Duke reached the Final Four — the program’s 18th — where Maluach had 14 points in an 85-65 win over Alabama. The run ended with a loss to Houston in the national semifinal, but Maluach had announced himself as one of the most promising young centers in the world.
Duke finished 35-4. Maluach, Flagg (#1 pick), and Knueppel (#4 pick) all declared for the 2025 NBA Draft — three top-ten picks from the same freshman class.
After Duke
On June 25, 2025, Khaman Maluach was selected 10th overall by the Houston Rockets in the 2025 NBA Draft. He was immediately traded to the Phoenix Suns as part of the blockbuster Kevin Durant deal that sent Durant to Houston in exchange for Jalen Green, Dillon Brooks, the #10 pick, and additional draft capital. The trade was finalized on July 6, 2025.
Maluach was the third Duke player taken in the top ten of the 2025 draft — after Cooper Flagg (#1, Dallas Mavericks) and Kon Knueppel (#4, Charlotte Hornets). Three teammates in the top ten. One had been playing basketball for five years.
The Suns view Maluach as their center of the future. They also acquired fellow Duke alum Mark Williams from Charlotte on draft night, providing a veteran presence while Maluach develops. Scouting reports praise his defensive potential — his size, length, lateral quickness, and rim protection are all considered elite tools — while noting that his offensive game, currently limited to dunks, lobs, putbacks, and dunker-spot finishes, has significant room for growth.
In December 2025, Maluach was assigned to the Suns’ G League affiliate, the Valley Suns, for development. Through his first NBA season, he has appeared in a handful of games for the parent club while spending most of his time developing in the G League — a patient approach consistent with his age (he turned 19 in September 2025) and the fact that he is still, remarkably, in his sixth year of playing organized basketball.
Where Is He Now
Khaman Maluach is a rookie with the Phoenix Suns, splitting time between the NBA roster and the Valley Suns of the G League. He is nineteen years old.
His agent is Josh Hairston of Klutch Sports, working alongside Rich Paul. His brother Majok remains in Uganda and watches Khaman’s games on YouTube because watching on live television makes him too emotional. His mother still lives in Kawempe. His father is still in South Sudan.
Maluach’s connection to Luol Deng has come full circle. Deng’s foundation camp in Uganda in 2019 was the moment that changed everything. Maluach wore Deng’s #9 at Duke. Deng, who is profiled elsewhere in this project, is now the president of the South Sudan Basketball Federation — the same federation that put Maluach on a World Cup roster at sixteen and an Olympic roster at seventeen. The Brotherhood, in this case, is literal: two South Sudanese men, separated by a generation, connected by Duke, connected by basketball, connected by the belief that sport can transform lives.
“Basketball means a big thing to me,” Maluach told BBC Sport Africa. “I believe it’s a gift God gave me to impact other people’s lives and to change my family’s life.”
“The orange ball has taken me so far.”
He speaks four languages. He prays every day. He practiced his first shots through stacked tires in a Ugandan suburb. He watched Giannis on midnight data plans. He played his first organized game in Crocs. He represented a nation younger than himself at the Olympics. He wore #9 to honor the man who showed him the door.
He is nineteen years old, and he is just beginning.