Pascal Siakam

Pascal Siakam ( ; born 2 April 1994) is a Cameroonian professional basketball player for the Toronto Raptors of the National Basketball Association (NBA). A two-time NBA All-Star and two-time All-NBA selection, he won an NBA championship with the Raptors in 2019. Siakam played college basketball for the New Mexico State Aggies and was named the Western Athletic Conference Player of the Year in 2016. Nicknamed "Spicy P", he was selected by Toronto with the 27th overall pick in the first round of the 2016 NBA draft. After being assigned to the NBA Development League (now the G League) as a rookie in 2017, Siakam led Toronto's affiliate team to a league championship, earning Finals Most Valuable Player honors. He was named the NBA's Most Improved Player in 2019, becoming the first player to win an NBA title in the same season. The following year, Siakam led Toronto to the second-best record in the league, earning All-NBA Second Team while being named a starter in his first NBA All-Star Game. He became the first player to play in the G League and to start an All-Star game. Early life Siakam was born in Douala, Cameroon, to Tchamo and Victorie Siakam, the youngest of four brothers. His father, Tchamo, worked for a local transit company and was also the mayor of Makénéné. According to a story by Jackie MacMullan of ESPN, Pascal was effectively "hand-picked to embody his family's Catholicism." His father thus enrolled him in St. Andrew's Seminary in Bafia at age 11. By the time he was 15, he did not want to become a Catholic priest. Siakam initially had little interest in basketball in stark contrast to his older brothers, all of whom earned scholarships with the sport to various NCAA Division I colleges. He was discovered as a player at a local camp by Luc Mbah a Moute, whose parents' home in Bafia was about 2 miles (3 km) from St. Andrew's. Siakam attended Mbah a Moute's camp for the first time in 2011, a year before graduating from St. Andrew's, and he returned to it the following year, after which he was selected to attend the Basketball Without Borders camp. There, despite having had virtually no basketball experience at the time, he gained attention for his apparent athleticism and extremely high energy level. As Raptors president Masai Ujiri, who had been at this camp, recalled, "His effort was memorable." With Mbah a Moute as a mentor, Siakam moved to the United States at the age of 18.