{"id":448883,"date":"2026-01-31T05:14:14","date_gmt":"2026-01-31T05:14:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/448883\/"},"modified":"2026-01-31T05:14:14","modified_gmt":"2026-01-31T05:14:14","slug":"who-is-jongkuch-mach-what-to-know-about-17-year-old-prospect-taller-than-nbas-victor-wembanyama","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/448883\/","title":{"rendered":"Who is Jongkuch Mach? What to Know About 17-Year-Old Prospect Taller Than NBA’s Victor Wembanyama"},"content":{"rendered":"

17-year-old prospect Jongkuch Mach is already taller than every single active NBA player including San Antonio Spurs star Victor Wembanyama, as Mach stands at 7’6″.<\/p>\n

He currently plays in Australia, suiting up for the Centre of Excellence (CoE) in NBL1 East Men’s Conference. <\/p>\n

Mach was born in Perth after his parents emigrated from South Sudan.<\/p>\n

In 16 appearances during the 2025 NBL1 season, he averaged 2.7 points, 3.2 rebounds and 1.0 blocks in 10.2 minutes per game while shooting 70 percent from the field. <\/p>\n

While Mach doesn’t possess the long-range shooting prowess that Wembanyama does, he still connected on 70 percent of his free throws. <\/p>\n

Mach’s agent, Solomon Dech, revealed that his client has worked to put on more weight over the past year. <\/p>\n

“Being 7’6″ and just 18, it’s challenging \u2013 but he’s put on 20 kilos in the last 12 months,” Dech told Joshua Higgins<\/a> of Fox Sports Australia. “It’s a blessing and a curse at the same time, because being that tall comes with a lot of physical challenges. But I think what the Centre of Excellence has done is an excellent job stripping him back and rebuilding him properly.”<\/p>\n

He’s already received interest from several colleges including LSU, Charlotte, Colorado, Washington State, Santa Clara and South Carolina (via Higgins). <\/p>\n

Given Mach’s height and his ability to finish around the rim, he’s one of the most intriguing international basketball prospects and could suit up at the collegiate level in the future.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"17-year-old prospect Jongkuch Mach is already taller than every single active NBA player including San Antonio Spurs star…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":448884,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[64,63,590,85],"class_list":["post-448883","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/448883","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=448883"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/448883\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/448884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=448883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=448883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=448883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}