“Situational Analysis” is a series of articles that seeks to examine the circumstances that most often influence an NBA prospect’s success. Each player will be scored on a scale from 1-10 in four different categories: NBA-specific skill(s), fatal flaw(s), collegiate/overseas/pre-NBA environment, and ideal NBA ecosystem.
Khaman Maluach is an 18-year-old center from Rumbek, South Sudan, and grew up in Kawempe, a district in Kampala, Uganda,.who averaged 8.6 points, 6.6 rebounds, and 1.3 blocks in 21.3 minutes per game for the Duke Blue Devils. He is expected to be selected in the lottery in the 2025 NBA Draft. NBADraft.net currently has him projected at No. 13.
NBA-Specific Skills
Placing Khaman Maluach near the basket – and doing nothing else – is the start to a solid team defensive strategy.
As long as the rim sits 10 feet above the court, players with Maluach’s physical dimensions will always be valuable. At 7-2 with a 9-8 standing reach and a 7-6 wingspan, Maluach is a shot-erasing behemoth. It’s not even the blocked-shot stats that will wow you. It’s the shots that opposing players don’t even think of trying. It’s the driving lanes that guards don’t take. It’s the lobs that never materialize.
If Maluach was a slow-footed stiff, he would still likely get drafted based on size alone. Maluach, however, can move much better than players with comparable measurables. He can slide his feet and get into shot-blocking position without fouling. He also loves to run the floor in transition and turn defense into offense. Maluach plays with a high motor and a team-first mentality.
Offensively, the skills are raw, but the hands/touch are feather soft. Players such as Maluach often struggle to catch the ball in traffic, but his hands make him an incredible lob threat and offensive rebounder. He has much better feel than comparable big-man projects, even if he never develops a perimeter jumper or any ball handling skills.
Skepticism surrounds his reported age (reportedly turns 19 September 14), but if his age is even remotely accurate, there is more upside and development potential with Maluach than any other player in this draft aside from his Duke teammate, Cooper Flagg. The idealized version of Maluach is a game-changing presence on both ends of the floor who can knock down free throws in close contests and anchor a championship-level defense.
On a scale from 1-10, Maluach’s defensive upside rates at a 9.
Fatal Flaws
Calling Maluach’s offensive game “raw” is an understatement. Maluach’s offensive skill level is sushi.
Today’s NBA is built around teams who have multiple players who can shoot, pass, and dribble at high levels. Despite his defensive upside, Maluach is not yet at an NBA level in any of those categories.
He also struggled a bit with stamina his freshman season – understandable, given how hard he plays in his stints on the floor, but his production fell off a cliff anytime he was on the floor for an extended period. Other players have carved out NBA careers despite this flaw (Mitchell Robinson and Robert Williams III come to mind), but a team selecting a player this high is hoping to get someone who can eventually play more than 20 minutes per game.
Defensively, we know what he’s capable of in the lane. But can he hold up well enough on the perimeter when elite guards call him into switches and force him to dance on the perimeter? Even players as defensively dominant as Rudy Gobert can find themselves in no-man’s land on the perimeter.
Maluach is a high-character player and extremely coachable, but these are things that any player his size must overcome to reach their potential. As high as his ceiling is, Maluach’s floor might be even lower.
On a scale from 1 (not a concern) to 10 (serious hindrance), Maluach’s relative rawness rates at a 9.
Pre-NBA Setting
I hope Luol Deng one day gets the credit he deserves for his influence on international basketball.
Deng has helped bring much-needed infrastructure and visibility to many prospects in Africa who otherwise wouldn’t have had the opportunity to participate in high-level basketball.
Maluach joined NBA Academy Africa at 14, developed into a fixture on the South Sudan basketball scene and joined the national team at 16 and helped his country qualify for the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris. He rocketed up international prospect lists performing well at the 2024 Nike Hoop Summit in Portland, and found his way toward Durham along with one of the best recruiting classes in recent memory.
Maluach and Flagg anchored a formidable Duke defense, with each player complementing the other. Flagg’s roaming tenacity, coupled with Maluach’s dependable back-line presence, made this team extremely difficult to drive against.
Maluach was allowed to develop at his own pace in his only season with the Blue Devils – never asked to do more than what he was capable of doing, while gaining confidence and experience alongside other future NBA players.
He didn’t dominate every game – far from it – but he did enough things nobody else in this draft class can do to generate lottery-level interest.
On a scale from 1-10, Maluach’s pre-NBA career rates at an 8.
Ideal NBA Ecosystem
Maluach needs time.
If you are an NBA general manager drafting Maluach to be your defensive anchor right away for 30 minutes per game, you will be disappointed. Maluach needs to find a team with other high-level big men who can set an example for him – preferably a defense-first rim runner who can mentor him through the timing and processing speed required of an NBA center.
Atlanta – picking No. 13 overall – makes a great deal of sense for Maluach. This is a roster overflowing with quick/long wings and strong rim-running centers who can help put Maluach in a position to succeed. Clint Capela and Onyeka Okongwu (as long as they remain in Atlanta) are terrific players for Maluach to model his game after, and Trae Young is one of the best lob throwers in basketball. It’s a terrific situation for Maluach to grow at his own pace.
However, Maluach might not last until No. 13. Maluach is exactly the kind of prospect who tends to rise on draft boards – all you need to do is take one look at him reaching as high as he can. New Orleans, picking at No. 7, could roll the dice on Maluach’s upside. This franchise is in no-man’s land for as long as Zion Williamson’s on/off-court struggles (to put them mildly) handcuff them. But outside of Zion, there is a ton of athletic defensive upside here, and Maluach could develop into the rim-protecting linchpin to take this Pelicans defense to another level.
On a scale from 1-10, Maluach rates as a 9 among the draft’s most situationally dependent players. He needs the right coach, the right organization, the right defensive philosophy, and the right lob-throwing guard to help him maximize his potential.
