From Lagos to Houston via a basketball clinic

Olajuwon grew up in Lagos, Nigeria, the son of working-class parents. He didn’t pick up a basketball until he was 15 — he’d been a soccer goalkeeper and team handball player. A traveling US State Department coach named Christopher Pond saw him at a Lagos basketball clinic in 1980, recommended him to college coaches at Houston, Providence, North Carolina, and a few others, and helped arrange a flight to the United States.

Olajuwon arrived in Houston in October 1980 not knowing the city had any other Nigerian community to speak of. He didn’t play his freshman year — he was redshirted while he learned the American game. By his sophomore year he was the starting center on a team that would become the most-feared front court in college basketball.

Phi Slama Jama, three Final Fours

The 1982-83 and 1983-84 Houston teams — coached by Guy V. Lewis — went 31-3 and 32-5 respectively. The starting lineup included Olajuwon at center, Clyde Drexler at wing, Michael Young, Larry Micheaux, and Alvin Franklin. The team’s running, dunking, above-the-rim style earned them the nickname Phi Slama Jama from a Houston Post columnist; the name stuck and was officially adopted as a fake fraternity.

Houston reached the 1982 Final Four and lost to UNC in the national semifinal — the same UNC team Michael Jordan led to the title with a corner jumper. In 1983 Houston reached the championship game and lost the most-famous upset in tournament history: NC State’s Lorenzo Charles dunking Dereck Whittenburg’s airball with one second left, 54-52. In 1984 they made it back and lost to Patrick Ewing’s Georgetown 84-75.

Drafted, then a championship in the same building

The Rockets had the #1 pick in 1984 thanks to a coin flip with Portland (the pre-lottery system). They took Olajuwon first overall. Portland took Sam Bowie second. Chicago took Michael Jordan third. The 1984 Draft is regarded as one of the deepest in NBA history.

Olajuwon won back-to-back NBA championships with Houston in 1994 and 1995 — both in The Summit, the arena built directly across town from his college dorm. He was named NBA MVP in 1994. The University of Houston retired his #34 jersey on November 25, 1996. The school named the renovated Phi Slama Jama Foyer of the Fertitta Center after him in 2018.

Background facts cross-referenced with the Wikipedia article on Hakeem Olajuwon and Pro-Football-Reference / Basketball-Reference public records.