Arizona basketball transfer Sali Kourouma motivated by her 'big school' opportunity

A hard workout; a torn ACL; the thought of living far from home; even the need to support her family clear across the globe.

Throw just about anything at Salimatou Kourouma, and she’ll find a way to get through it — doing so most likely with a smile on her face.

But that’s not to say her road to the Arizona women’s basketball program — an intertwined journey of life, education and hoops that started in Mali and eventually landed her in Kansas, Texas, Arkansas and now Tucson — has been easy.

Kourouma wanted to “challenge myself to the big, big school and take my life to a new level,” she said of ultimately ending up at the UA.

“That’s why I chose this school,” she continued. “There is the opportunity for me to play and have fun with my life.”

The 5-11 transfer played two years at Little Rock, earning Ohio Valley Conference Player of the Year honors last season while averaging 17 points and seven rebounds per game and shooting 41% from the field.

She is a redshirt senior for the Wildcats, listed as a wing with two years of eligibility left.

‘Work hard and do everything for them’

While Kourouma said she loves being in Tucson, of course, she misses home. Kati, Mali, is about a 90-minute drive from the town of Koulikoro, where UA men’s basketball center Oumar Ballo is originally from, but it’s upward of 6,500 miles from Tucson. She does go home occasionally, like this past summer when she played for her national team at Afrobasket, helping Mali take home the bronze medal.

Seeing her family is at the top of the list when she does get home, but also among her favorite things to do back in Mali is play basketball with local children. This summer, she asked her Wildcat teammates for any athletic shoes they aren’t wearing anymore, so she could give them to the young players in Mali who don’t have shoes to practice in.

That’s just one part of Kourouma’s giving nature.

One day last year, she heard some devastating news from her mom, Souleymane Kourouma: the family house had been destroyed in a storm months earlier. The family was now living in a house with one of her dad’s (Fatoumatou Guiro) brothers.

“It was tough,” Sali Kourouma said. “I couldn’t imagine that one day I (would) hear this bad news from them.

“I am the first child to attend (college) and out of the country, so that’s why my mom didn’t tell me earlier,” she said. “I like to work hard and do everything for them. She knew that if she told me earlier, I would tell her that I’m going to just come back home and try to work and help them.”

But instead of leaving school, Sali Kourouma figured out a way to help them from the United States; she was enrolled at the time at the University of Arkansas Little Rock. She started a GoFundMe page and delivered the money she raised to them last summer.

It hasn’t stopped there. Despite being so far from home, Kourouma feels like she carries a load for her family. So much so, that anything she gets from Arizona, such as scholarship money, “I divide by two and give them half.”

“I try to manage with the other half,” Kourouma said. “It is tough because if you’re not from here, you’ve got to pay taxes. You have to pay the rent. The electricity is a lot. I’m trying to manage all that together with going to school and playing basketball.”

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Kourouma said that UA coach Adia Barnes has been trying to help her find someone in Mali to assist in rebuilding her family’s house.

“She cares,” Kourouma said. “It means a lot, especially a coach with a different culture from mine, who doesn’t know about my culture but tries her best to know everything. Coach Adia tries to take care of every girl who comes here and ... to figure out what their needs are, what they are looking for.”

From the pitch to the court

Kourouma played soccer first, but once she saw someone playing basketball, she was intrigued. She had an instinct she’d be good at it, and she was right. She played on the under-age teams (U16 and U17) tied to Mali’s national team and drew attention from coaches in the U.S. After originally planning to come to Phoenix for a high school basketball opportunity, she ended up at Life Prep Academy in Wichita, Kansas.

With four minutes left in her final game of her senior year, she tore her right ACL. Her dreams of playing NCAA Division I college basketball seemed dashed — especially as there was a delay in scheduling surgery with Kourouma being a student on a visa and her high school playing career over.

She relied on her host family — John and Cathy Weideman — to get through this tough time.

“I couldn’t afford anything,” Kourouma said. “They helped me with food, getting treatment and doing rehab. They helped me a lot. They even named me “Sali Weideman.” They call me their daughter. I love them. They love me.”

With her surgery behind her, two-a-days were the norm as she routinely worked with a physical therapist. She was willing to do anything to get back onto the court.

That’s when she found Grayson College, a junior college in Denison, Texas. She redshirted her first year to come back ever stronger. Kourouma ended up being named first-team All-Conference while also winning the conference’s Newcomer of the Year award as she averaged 18.7 points and 10.3 rebounds per game, finishing with 15 double-doubles.

Moving on to Little Rock, she didn’t miss a beat. That first season, she led the Trojans, a D-I program that moved from the Sun Belt conference to the OVC in 2022, by averaging 18.4 points per game.

This offseason, when Kourouma entered the transfer portal, Barnes was interested, seeing Kourouma as a fit on her retooled roster. Kouruma is a “blue-collar player, like I love,” Barnes said.

“For us, she can play the three and the four. She’s a defensive player. She’s physical. She’s going to be a really good rebounder. I really like her,” Barnes said. “She’s a tough player, and we haven’t had that toughness. She’s super gritty.”

Sure, Kourouma likes to do just about everything on the court, but she especially likes to play defense.

“I’m really aggressive,” she said. “If I see a ball, I have to go for it. I try to be in the passing lane, in front of the person.”

ESPNW recently recognized Kourouma’s game, too, listing her as No. 23 among the nation’s top 35 transfers ahead of the 2023-24 season. ESPNW said she was “one of the best mid-major players in the country.”

Kourouma already feels welcome in Tucson, and she’s already made dishes from her homeland for her roommate, UA forward Esmery Martinez. Her teammates, coaches, staffers and others at UA “care about her,” she said.

And, in turn, she is giving it right back on the court for her new family.

“I’m not a player who likes to quit,” Kourouma said. “I will work really hard to get where I want to be. And try to help my teammates be great players and be there for them ... do my part in a game and try to do my best on everything.”