Anas Osama Mahmoud Officially Signs with Louisville

Mark BlankenbakerApril 22, 2014

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Anas Osama Mahmoud, a 7-1, 205-pound forward/center from Cairo, Egypt who played last season at West Oaks Academy in Orlando, Fla., has signed a national letter-of-intent to continue his basketball playing career at the University of Louisville.

“,” said UofL Men’s Basketball Coach Rick Pitino. “He is a very skilled athlete who is a very good scorer and passer. His only weakness is strength. We will base a consideration of redshirting him on how quickly he can gain necessary strength to be effective. We’re delighted to have Anas at the University of Louisville.”

Mahmound (name is pronounced AH-nahs o-SAW-mah mah-MOOD) averaged 13.8 points, 8.8 rebounds and 3.1 blocked shots last season for West Oaks, which posted a 28-8 record in 2013-14. He is ranked 99th in the ESPN100.

Mahmoud came to the United States in September for his senior year at West Oaks. He began playing basketball on club teams in Egypt when he was 12 and played in recent years with Egyptian national teams. He was a reserve on the 2013 Egyptian senior national team and averaged 5.4 points and 4.0 rebounds the previous summer for his country’s 2012 U17 team.

Mahmoud, who intends to major in engineering at UofL, speaks four languages, including English, Arabic, French and German. He chose to attend UofL after also considering Georgia Tech, Minnesota and Cincinnati. He had 23 Division I scholarship offers and publicly committed to the Cardinals on March 3.

Mahmoud is the sixth member of the Cardinals’ signing class, which has been listed among the top ten in the nation (4th ESPN, 6th Bleacher Report, 7th Rivals.com, 8th Scout.com, 9th 247 Sports). He joins Shaqquan Aaron, a 6-7, 175-pound guard from Rainier Beach High School in Seattle, Wash.; Jaylen Johnson, a 6-9, 215-pound forward from Ypsilanti (Mich.) High School; Chinanu Onuaku, a 6-10, 230-pound forward/center from Lanham, Md. and Riverdale Baptist High School; Quentin Snider, a 6-1, 170-pound guard from Ballard High School in Louisville; and Matz Stockman, a 7-1, 235-pound forward/center from Oslo, Norway.

Mahmoud and Stockman are the first seven-footers to play for the Cardinals since Felton Spencer, a 7-0 center from Louisville who scored 1,168 points at UofL from 1986-90. David Schrag, a 7-1 center from Winterthur, Switzerland, who prepped at Maine Central Institute, initially signed to play with the Cardinals in 1997 but went to Vincennes instead.