National Basketball Association

Multiple Timberwolves aiding NBA's international growth efforts

Published May. 14, 2014 1:25 p.m. ET

foxsports

The NBA continues to expand its global reach, and select members of the internationally enriched Minnesota Timberwolves have a role in the process this spring and summer.

Center Gorgui Dieng is currently in his home country of Senegal, where last week he helped launch the NBA and U.S. Agency for International Development's "Live, Learn and Play" program in the capital city of Dakar. May 17-18, he'll conduct his own basketball camp in the city of Kemeber, where he grew up before coming to America, winning a national championship at Louisville and being drafted 21st overall last summer.

Dieng, one of 28 NBA draft picks who previously participated in a Basketball Without Borders clinic, is also building a basketball court in Kemeber for the community to use.

It was announced Tuesday that Timberwolves center Ronny Turiaf and player development coach Bobby Jackson will partake in the league's Basketball Without Borders camp next month. June 13-16 marks Basketball Without Borders Asia's first trip to the city. Turiaf, a native of Martinique, has been an ambassador at previous events in China.

The top 50 players born in 1996 or 1997 from more than 20 Asian and Oceanic countries will be present at the Taipei event. So, too, will Yao Ming, along with Turiaf, Jackson and a handful of other NBA personalities.