News Summary

He digs another photo out of the pile — it’s a stick-figured Nigerian player with arms draping almost to his knees, holding a ball with his fingertips.

"One of them is 7 foot tall and I think a (U.S.) school is working with him," the attorney said. "I’m trying to help place them."

While Nigeria is a hidden treasure trove for the basketball world, some are reluctant to invest in the hunt for gifted players in a country where it’s not uncommon to find fraudulent academic records and birth certificates.

Ukwu is not one of them.

He has helped more than a dozen Nigerians come to the United States to play college or high school basketball. He’s a one-man show. He markets the players to coaches, finds host families and helps with any immigration or academic papers.

Ukwu sees his efforts as commendable, saving athletically talented Africans from some of the poorest villages and giving them a life of opulence by African standards.

But by assisting colleges in recruiting prospects, Ukwu may be violating National Collegiate Athletic Association rules on boosters.

The NCAA defines a booster as someone known to an institution who helps attract players to that school. Boosters are prohibited from making in-person contacts with prospects, including communication by phone or mail.

Ukwu acknowledges his influence over the Nigerian players he brings to the United States.

"When I bring in a Nigerian, he doesn’t know the difference in the top schools, so I say go to GW and he goes to GW," he said.

In 1991, Ukwu helped 7-foot-1-inch Yinka Dare come to the United States with the understanding he would attend George Washington University. He attended the university for two years before playing professionally.

Ukwu did the same in 1993 with Obinna Ekezie, but the player changed his mind after arriving in the United States and attended the University of Maryland.

Ukwu said he doesn’t recruit for George Washington University or any other institution.

While Ukwu said he’s never been paid to place players in the United States, he lists "sports law," including the review of professional contracts, as one of his specialties.

"I’m not representing anyone, as an agent," he said. "At some point I’d like to be."

‘UNCLE UKWU, PLEASE HELP ME’
When Ukwu goes to Nigeria, approximately 10 times a year, basketball players from villages dozens of miles away meet him at the airport or wait outside his law office in Lagos, pleading, "Uncle Ukwu, please help me," he said.

"They wait in my office there for five hours," he said. "They are all sweaty — I can smell them in the law office. They are sitting on desks and lying on the floor, waiting for me. They have been sleeping."

Ukwu discovered Yinka Dare during a visit to Lagos in 1991. While driving he noticed a very tall man sitting on a bench eating a bowl of food.

"I looked at his knees and he looked tall even though he was sitting. . . . I asked how tall are you, and he didn’t know his height," said Ukwu, who came to the United States in 1978.

He called George Washington University assistant coach Ed Meyers, who flew there four days later to meet Dare.

Meyers "had brought a measuring tape and he asked him to step on one end of the tape and he raised it up and he said he’s 7-foot-1," Ukwu said.

Ukwu paid for Dare’s plane ticket to come to America.

The influx of international athletes to American schools wouldn’t happen without people like Ukwu. Coaches often develop long-standing relationships with middlemen who can steer players their way.

Dare had already graduated from high school in Nigeria when he came to the United States, but he spoke no English. He attended Milford Academy, a prep school in Connecticut, for a year before enrolling at George Washington.

The coach at Milford at the time was Scott Spinelli, who once played under then-George Washington coach Mike Jarvis. Ukwu said Jarvis sent Dare to Spinelli's school because he knew the coach would deliver the player to George Washington.

"With Jarvis we hid Yinka Dare," Ukwu said. "Mike Jarvis was afraid of him becoming a big name . . . He (Jarvis) said take this kid to this high school . . . We had to take him to a coach he was sure would deliver him to GW when the time came."

By placing an athlete in a favorable school, the university has an unfair recruiting advantage, NCAA Vice President of Membership Services Steve Mallonee said.

"If the facts are true, you have a middle person out there on behalf of the school facilitating the contact and recruitment of these individuals and the school has knowledge of that — that’s not suppose to happen," Mallonee said.

Jarvis said he suggested three schools for Dare to attend, including Milford, but that he didn’t hide Dare or violate NCAA rules.

"We did exactly what we have always done. We recommend those places we feel comfortable (with)," said Jarvis, now head coach at St. John’s University in New York City.

Spinelli wouldn't return calls.

Dare attended George Washington for two years before the New Jersey Nets picked him in the first round of the 1994 NBA draft. He is now a reserve player on the Idaho Stampede team in the Continental Basketball Association.

"I recommended he not go," Jarvis said. "Our evaluation was correct. He wasn’t ready."

‘HOW BIG IS YOUR SON?’
Ukwu said he and Jarvis worked together again — after Ukwu spotted 6-foot-10-inch, 265-pound Obinna Ekezie.

"How big is your son?" he asked Ekezie's mother. "She said ‘I don’t know but when he passes through my door he bends down.’ ”

After Ekezie’s visa had been denied in 1993, Ukwu said Jarvis personally wrote a letter to the U.S. ambassador in Nigeria on university letterhead.

"He would have to receive a scholarship by the prep (school) to come to the U.S. and in order for him to go to prep school, there would have had to been something from our school that would say we would look at him as prospect," Jarvis said. "I don’t remember if it had my name on it."

NCAA rules state neither a coach nor a representative of a university can offer any inducements to a prospective student.

"If someone was pulling strings to get the prospect over here, then it could be construed as an improper offer and inducement," violating NCAA rules, Mallonee said.

After Ekezie’s visa was approved, the plan was set in motion for him to play at George Washington. Like Dare, he went to a prep school to learn English and prepare for college, staying two years at Worcester Academy in Massachusetts.

"All of us thought it was over, it was GW," Ukwu said. He (Ekezie) calls and says, ‘Uncle I hope you’re not going to get angry but I don’t want to go to GW.’ ”

Ekezie went to the University of Maryland in 1995 and is now playing for the NBA's Washington Wizards.

Ukwu said he doesn’t make money helping basketball players, but that his new venture — representing professional boxers — will be profitable.

"If I bring any boxers here, it’s because I’m going to make money," he said.