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Luol Deng and the South Sudan Basketball Team celebrate their first ever Olympics qualification in the locker room



Luol Deng and the South Sudan Basketball Team celebrate their first ever Olympics qualification in the locker room

by TheRealPdGaming

16 Comments

  1. cough_landing_on_you

    Lakers about to offer him a contract.

  2. nooblevelum

    Do Lakers get credit for this? They still paying Luol’s contract lol

  3. Rammstonna

    « Paris is where we go », only if they qualify for the quarter finals will they play in Paris, otherwise it’s in Lille. They’ll still have the opening and closing ceremony in Paris.

  4. Minute-Decent

    This is so wholesome. I’m happy for Sudan

  5. paultissimo

    This is really big for South Sudan.

    For context, South Sudan has been suffering from myriad of civil wars. Even before 2011, when S. Sudan became independent, there were two Sudanese civil wars that left over a million dead. During the reign of tyranny by al-Bashir, the region of Darfur suffered through Darfur Genocide on 2004 (which left hundreds of thousands dead), on the suspicion that they were joining South Sudan for independence. If you got time, search up about al-Bashir – he is up there with Pol Pot when it comes to tyranny (thankfully, he was imprisoned in 2019.)

    After South Sudan acquired independence from Sudan in 2011, just two years later, a 7-year civil war broke out because of tribal tensions, and there are still conflicts going on even after armistices. UNHCR statistic says there are 2.3 million South Sudanese refugees as of 2022, but number is likely way higher than that.

    Imagine this. Three Civil Wars. First one was 1955 to 1972. Second one was 1983 to 2005. Third one was from 2013 to 2020. That adds up to 46 years.

    One of my friends who is South Sudanese was very excited to see the FIBA basketball tournament. This is so big for a country that had more than half of its 12-year life in Civil War. I will probably mention about this tomorrow when I meet him 😛

    Also, to let more people be aware there is a civil war in Sudan that broke in 2023 which resulted in at least 800k refugees (from last month when I checked from UNHCR website) – but again, the actual number is likely way higher than that.

  6. PsychedelicWalton

    For all the people who say teams like South Sudan dont deserve to be part of these events because “well the europe teams are better and the balkans are blah blah whatever.” Go fuck yourselves.

  7. fireglz

    Honestly, this is the ideal ending to the Danny Ferry/Luol Deng saga.

    Dude reps Africa like a hero.

  8. jumboponcho

    This is really what it’s all about, especially what they’ve gone through

  9. tomatomac

    I could be wrong but didn’t deng play for the GB Olympic team in 2012. I thought the Olympics were stricter with the fact that you fan only represent one country. Please correct me if I’m wrong, but either way congrats to South Sudan – amazing achievement.

    Edit: I realise now that he is coaching the team. The way it was worded I thought he was still playing lol

  10. L45TPH45E

    And this is why the NBA is just a job and not the World Championship.

  11. hankbaumbachjr

    So happy for Luol Deng! Dude was always a class act.

    Don’t let Lakers fans meme him in to something he’s not because of their franchise’s bad management, Luol Deng deserves this.

  12. friendly_tanod

    We’ll support both SSD and JPN on the Olympics. These guys really play well together and know their roles. Hoping that politics won’t mess these teams up similar to how politics ruined (and continues to ruin) PHI basketball.

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