Tanzania gets taste of NCAA tournament through Thabeet

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DETROIT — The word from Tanzania is that the people have Final Four fever. Now that they know what it means.

"Even the older people are excited," Lawrence Cheyo said over the phone, as secretary general of the Tanzania Basketball Federation. "For the first time, people are following the NCAA. They watch the NBA here, but they are starting to realize what the NCAA is."

All this buzz, of course, surrounds Connecticut's 7-3 Hasheem Thabeet. Back home, about the only thing taller is Mount Kilimanjaro. As Michigan State coach Tom Izzo said Thursday, "My luck, we would run into a team that's got a 12-foot center."

Thabeet's strange road to Ford Field has become the stuff of Big East legend; the former soccer player from Africa who did not start playing basketball until 15, and once pursued opportunity in America by randomly e-mailing college coaches he found on a Google search. This while working odd jobs as a club bouncer and runway model, supporting the family after his father died.

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Now he is 22, Big East co-player of the year as a junior and two games from the national championship. In Tanzania, those with access to the broadcasts will be watching at 1 a.m. Sunday, when Connecticut meets Michigan State. Those who don't will check radios, newspapers, computers, word of mouth.

Msomaji

Mike Lopresti, Gannett