Have you ever played basketball in a creative and funny way? Nothing can do that but only Soufiane Bernoukh. Soufiane is a Muslim comedian who became an internet sensation because of his basketball content in social media. There are a lot of best streetballers on the internet and Soufiane is one of them, but his unique style of playing the Naismith Game and doing some of the signature shots in the NBA has gained so much attention.
Unlike any other basketball player who wears a jersey, Soufiane wears “thobe”, a Muslim dress described as ankle-length robe usually with long sleeves. This clothing is usually worn for prayer and for the men to become modest in their attire. Aside from that, he normally does his funny and creative moves not in the court but sometimes in his office, rooms, or warehouse-like environment using a small ring and a small ball, similar to kiddie-size basketball. When he makes a shot out of the small ball, no matter how far or near it is, using his creative shots although heavily guarded by his opponents, he will make it to the rim.
This makes netizens hooked-up for his videos because it is so hard to make a shot like that and the creativity and fun it takes to make that kind of video. Aside from hooping, he also makes videos like skillful assists (passing the ball)to his teammates, wild basketball entrances, and playing an imaginary championship game.
Bernoukh also established his clothing line and restaurant named “Halal Wrist”. Halal in Arabic means “permissible” and “wrist” connected to the basketball. His businesses are also known for the tagline “When The Prayer Goes Up, The Blessings Come Down.” The restaurant and clothing line also helps Muslim and community by empowering and inspiring them through friendship and solidarity by way of basketball spearheaded by Bernoukh. He also launched a social media drive to help or donate for the iftar of our Muslim friends in their community for the Ramadan and an online campaign that helps Muslim minority to combat hunger and poverty.
As of this writing, the Instagram of Bernoukh has 345K followers, his TikTok of 600k plus followers and 12.1 million likes and a million of views of videos in various social media. He is also featured in different social media pages for coverages of his works and of being a trending baller online.
Bernoukh also played for the Ferrum Panthers at Ferrum College in the USA.