Nik Khamenia was looking for a better fit when he entered the transfer portal less than two weeks after his freshman season at Duke ended in gut-wrenching fashion.
He had been subbed out for Cayden Boozer seconds before the deflection and the devastating 35-foot dagger from Braylon Mullins that sent the Blue Devils packing and UConn back to the Final Four.
It had been a fine freshman season for Khamenia, but he didn't have the role a top-15 recruit and McDonald's All-American typically would, coming off the bench behind a logjam of talent. With top freshman forward Dame Sarr set to return and a pair of high-profile 7-footers in Joaquim Boumtje Boumtje and Cameron Williams coming in as freshmen, the path forward at Duke wasn't looking favorable.
So Khamenia entered the portal hoping to find his opportunity elsewhere.
UConn, the school that had just ripped his team's championship hopes and dreams away, was interested in providing it. And the player who perfected a role he could fulfill, and accomplished everything he's dreamt of accomplishing – Alex Karaban – was doing his best to play matchmaker, texting both parties while he prepared for the NBA Draft in Chicago; his heart still in Storrs.
Khamenia had Zoom visits with different potential suitors, but his connection with Dan Hurley and their shared obsession with basketball was natural.
"He was in a place that – I don't think a lot of players want to leave Duke, I don't think a lot of players want to leave UConn – but the opportunity and the role that he desired, it was a better fit for him here," Hurley said.
"And he seems like the type of human being that, if the best basketball fit for him was on Mars, he, the spaceman, would head out there with (Elon) Musk."
Ask anyone who knows both Khamenia and Karaban, "How are they different?" and watch them struggle to think of an answer.
They all try. Of course, Khamenia is his own player and his own man. He grew up in a Los Angeles basketball family and starred in his own right at Harvard-Westlake, where he built a resume strong enough to attract some of the best college programs in the country. It wouldn't be fair to discount his achievements, nor would it be fair to hold him to the expectations of UConn's all-time winningest player, a two-time national champion and the first active player to see his number go up in the Huskies of Honor.
But the similarities between the two are undeniable.
They are both sons of Eastern European immigrants, their fathers each coming to America from Belarus, where Khamenia's mother is also from, while Karaban's mom immigrated from Ukraine. They're both 6-foot-8 basketball junkies who grew up on opposite ends of the country and were recruited on very different levels – Karaban was ranked No. 118 in his class by 247Sports , Khamenia was No. 15 – but still ended up in Storrs.
This quote, from Harvard-Westlake coach David Rebibo about his former star, could describe either of them: "His love to do things and win and impact winning was always something that I loved. His skillset, his ability to play hard every possession, every play, every pass. Obviously it's a coach's dream, his selflessness, his family's desire to win and their blue-collar work ethic.
"Those are all dreams, but like, to me, that really stuck out. His desire to win everything he did. It mattered to him."
Karaban vouched for Khamenia before and after he committed, recognizing how his IQ and play style would fit with Hurley and the Huskies. He said in May that the comparisons were fair, but not without mentioning that Khamenia will bring his own element to the game as well.
"He was better than me in high school, so really he might be better," the former Huskies' captain said.
Khamenia doesn't go looking for what is being said about him online, but the algorithm is unavoidable. And the Duke fans are relentless.
Their grudge has a lot more to do with the program he went to, rather than the reason he left.
It isn't dissimilar from the scrutiny Kevin Durant faced when he joined the Golden State Warriors after they beat his Oklahoma City Thunder in an intense, seven-game Western Conference Finals series in 2016. KD won two championships with the Warriors.
Making three national championship appearances in the last four years, Hurley has elevated the UConn men's program to the status Duke has long had as perhaps the top program in the sport. Jon Scheyer has coached the Blue Devils to a No. 1 seed in back-to-back years but then suffered consecutive collapses, first to Houston in the Final Four and then to the Huskies after leading by 19 in the second half last March.
The rivalry was reignited with that unforgettable Elite Eight thriller, and Khamenia made himself an easy target when he joined the opposition. But he doesn't regret it.
"I definitely see (the hate) just because it's on my phone pretty much every day," he told The Courant. "But that's not really important to me. My family supports me, the people who care about me support me, my teammates support me, my coaches support me. So whatever fans that might not like the decision I made, it was my decision and I'm extremely happy and blessed to have made that decision. I think it's going to work out pretty well for me, so I'm not really worried about what they have to say."
It will all come to a head in what is sure to be an emotional meeting the day before Thanksgiving in Las Vegas.
"He is where his feet are. He's not thinking about last year, he's not thinking about anybody else but UConn basketball and Nik Khamenia getting better and doing everything he can to help UConn basketball win a national championship. That's at the forefront of his mind," Rebibo said. "Listen, he knew what he wanted. And I think he found a perfect fit."
After UConn's final exhibition game, a 23-point home win over Purdue in which Khamenia scored eight points and snared 11 rebounds, Hurley revealed a deal he made with his exciting new piece.
"We're going to really play to his talent and abilities and really move him around a lot on offense in a variety of ways," Hurley said. "But then, what he's got to pay us off with is by getting on the glass."
Khamenia averaged only 5.7 points, 3.3 rebounds and 1.0 assist in 19.8 minutes per game as a Duke freshman. Through three exhibition games with the Huskies, albeit without the full offensive playbook and without typical usage from Braylon Mullins, who missed the first two, he's played 29.3 minutes and averaged 13.0 points, 8.3 rebounds, 2.3 assists and 1.3 steals per game.
He shot 38.7% (12 of 31) from the field and 42.9% (6 of 14) from beyond the arc, where he hit at a 34% clip last season.
"I think Coach Hurley and his staff do such a great job of taking what they have and manipulating the offense to fit the player," Rebibo said. "You've seen them evolve every single year. … I think that's just a special trait for a coaching staff and I think it's an incredible fit for a guy like Nik who is a Swiss Army knife and can just do everything."
Karaban's role will be almost impossible to fill. But Khamenia is capable of taking it and making it his own.
"I think it fits my game pretty much to a T," he said. "Just pretty much doing everything – playing off ball, playing on ball, making passes, shooting, rebounding, guarding. Pretty much just being an all-around player, and I think that's what all of us are. … Playing against (UConn) last year was like, just try to trust whatever you could do and just hope that it works out. But seeing it now, it makes sense.
"I wouldn't know how another team would know every single thing that we're doing. Because, for some of us it's hard to know every single thing that we're doing."
