Former Wildcat Mo Tangara, If You Don’t Know of Him, You Should!

We caught up with former Arizona Wildcat basketball player Mo Tangara to see what he’s been up to, and he has been a busy man.

Alumni Arizona Wildcat Mohamed (Mo) Tangara is a Malian-American professional basketball player who loves playing the game of basketball, loves the University of Arizona and loves his country Mali even more.

Ever since he graduated from the U of A with a bachelor’s degree in Science, he has played basketball all over the world. In addition he has been a basketball and goodwill ambassador for his home country Malia connecting Americans with Malians. Mali is located in Western Africa.

Mo played for Arizona from 2004–2008, and it was an experience that changed his life for the better. He found a new home in America, and especially in Tucson with his Coach Lute Olsen and his teammates along with his tutor, friends and college girlfriend.

The game of basketball has taken Tangara all over the world from Spain to Qatar to playing in his home country of Mali for an Olympic qualifying game against rival Senegal which they won in front of the country, fans in the stands, friends and all of Mo’s family which includes 9 brothers and sisters and his parents Hamidou and Sitan.

Arizona Wildcats

I cannot tell you what a privledge it was to be able interview this fascinating, interesting, and motivated athlete and world citizen.  Following is my interview with my new friend Mo:

ZZ: Mo, I am so happy to be able to tell the world what you have been up to, from what I have read about you and your journey, you are someone who never gives up on anything and especially your dreams!  What would you say drives and keeps you going and striving to be a great basketball player?

Mo: I think it’s that I tried to help my family, then I had the opportunity to play basketball and get a degree, and I have a lot of people who look up to me in Mali, so I still have  energy..if you have a lot of people who look up to you, you have to put all you can into it and you keep on going, and I am healthy.

The next generations which come from Mali and Africa look up to me and they look at me as a role model “we want to be like this guy.” I want to keep going and keep playing with the Mali national team and keep playing and I am doing that.

ZZ: Must have been wonderful to play for Mali after playing in America, Spain, Qatar and other countries, what was the best thing or things you experienced playing and going back home to Mali?

Mo: I went to play at home, in a long time people in Mali didn’t see me play. We played against Senegal to qualify for the Olympics, first round, I played in front of my home town, home game, and we won and it was history, we had not beat Senegal for 26 years. My mom got to watch me play; she had never got to watch me play basketball. We won by 22 points. It was everything I worked for so long.

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People don’t know what you are doing, you come back home and make history in front of your family and your fans, the best moment of my career. It was very emotional, after the game, I couldn’t hold on to them.

I have been playing on a lot of international teams, I use my own money, and I have lost friends because of the national team. It was very touching. I became a national hero when I visit my village, so many people look up to me. Basketball is what made this happen, so I feel I just keep going.

ZZ: You and I were both cheering for Arizona last month at Staples Center, do you keep in contact with anyone you played with or any coaches you knew from your time at Arizona? Do you still feel connected? Were you able to connect with the team?

Mo: I am still connected to coach Lute, he really helped me in the past couple of months things were hard on me, he really helped me a lot and Lute and his wife texted me and encouraged me. I also keep in touch with teammate Mustafa Shakur (former Wildcat and NBA player for OKC).

I talk to Matt Brase (Director of Player Development for the Houston Rockets NBA Team), I played with him for one year. Daniel Dillon..he’s from Australia, he plays overseas.  I keep in touch with Channing Frye (Plays for the Orlando Magic NBA team) this past summer Salim Stoudamire and I work out.

Yes I Still feel connected, I still wear the colors, and the coaching staff and alumni reach out to me and invite me to the events. They want you to be part of the program. Anytime they have an event and have stuff going on, they invite me and I feel really really welcome.

Re: The NCAA Tournament in Los Angeles I went to the hotel and got a chance to talk to Stanley and Rondae, it was really good to talk to them. Rondae came to talk to me, he knew who I was. They come and shake your hand and they have a couple of minutes to talk to you. Rondae asked me what I am doing, I told him, ‘Hey go get it, and we got stuck against Villanova, so get this one!’ But it wasn’t meant to be.

ZZ: What do you miss most about the University of Arizona? What were some of your best memories?

Mo: The one thing that happened that I still remember to this day is when I played baseball or softball with Coach Lute my freshman year.  It was a charity and I didn’t know anything about how to play softball. He was very great to help me.

I hit the ball and I was running the wrong way. Everyone was saying stop, stop! Everybody was laughing, and then I started laughing. He got me to start to know softball and baseball pretty well. I didn’t know what was going on…do this do that, I decided to laugh too.

I miss the comradery. Especially for me, I didn’t have a family here, the team was the only thing I had, so it was like I had a family.

Mohamed Tangaro

ZZ: Do you have a funny story or a great memory that always stays with you as you have moved on from college and getting your Science degree from Arizona?

Mo: When I first got here, I didn’t know anything about the culture. I was having issues with my girlfriend who wanted me to express my love for her.

Here in the US you have to tell a woman you love them, but I didn’t tell her that, it’s not in my culture to do this.

She told me she was going to leave me if I don’t tell her I love her every hour and every day.  I dated her for a year. I sought out help from my tutor to deal with it, and I was told to tell her I love her all the time. If I tell her I love her it will change the whole mode.

In my culture, you don’t need to tell your woman you love her all the time, so I didn’t understand it and I had to make an adjustment. It did work, and at that time she had a mindset she was going to leave, when my tutor told me to tell a woman you love her, I didn’t know all the meaning behind it, but now I understood.

It was the best four years of my life honestly, a lot of my life changed.

ZZ: Tell me about your latest victories in Mali and what you have done to help your country’s team make it to the Olympics?

Mo: I am still on the national team, I am the captain. I am trying to help as much as I can to qualify to help this team to reach the Olympics, it’s going to take a lot of work to get money and buy equipment, to find out what we need to do, it’s a lot of work but I just want to do my part and help them to make it.

The next step is that I am going to South Africa in two weeks, going to play for three months with a club, I am going to play in a league there.

After that I am going to play in the Africa Cup with the Mali Africa team. I recruit players to go to join the national team and try to bring players here to America.

ZZ: What are you planning on doing back in the states on this trip?

Mo: I came to train and I started this project and I wanted to start something new to support the young kids in Mali. I am in Phoenix and about two weeks ago, our team went for an international tournament with select teams from the US. Basically a couple of high schools and college seniors went to play a tournament in France against Serbia, a couple of teams from Africa and Belgium, about 18 teams from all over the world.

As far as my foundation, right now what we want to do is that we want people to write a note of encouragement in English, ‘we are your friends’, and send them a U of A t-shirt to wear, I want everyone wearing these t-shirts and feel supported.

Mohamed Tangaro

I want to make sure I can get through to the kids, if we can bring t-shirts back from the states, we send them a message to ‘go do the right thing and don’t follow the crowd, people care about you.’  This is the project I am working on. When I am here I do projects like this, I do my training, I train the youth.

ZZ: What do your plans include? As a Malian Nation Hero, do you envision your life being there in Africa? In the USA? Or Somewhere else?  And, do you plan on coaching, or teaching, or becoming a politician Scientist or businessman of some sort?

Mo: We got a lot of great talent, and when they are willing and ready to play at a high level, for sure we will send some to Arizona for a look.  I shop talent, when I stop playing, I want to still be involved in basketball and help my country, coach, scout, I will do it all.

It’s hard to do politics, I just want to be in a position where I can work in the US and help people back home with a foundation.  Make sure kids in Mali have somewhere to go and have a good life.  Poor kids are the most vulnerable kids to be influenced by the wrong crowd. I feel like I am in a position to help, if I am here I can push the awareness and change life there. I am a US citizen, so that makes it easier.

ZZ: How is your family doing? Any brothers or sisters following in your footsteps?

Mo: They are doing well. With all the things going on in Mali, terrorist attacks in the capital, stuff like that is hard, but over all they do fine.

My younger brother plays ball too, he is about my height and next year would like to bring him to Junior College and play here in the US.

ZZ: What would you like to tell the Arizona Wildcat fans and the team if anything, do you have a message for them?

Mo: I want to thank everyone for the opportunity to come to the University of Arizona and the program. We have a great family here in Arizona and it includes everybody and I am privileged to be a part of the family.

I am sure next year Sean Miller is going to get us over the hump and it’s going to be tough, but he’s going to find a way to get us to the finish line, he’s doing a great job!

GO CATS!

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