Trinidad and To­ba­go bas­ket­baller Malique Lewis is set to con­tin­ue his ca­reer in Aus­tralia with Na­tion­al Bas­ket­ball League (NBL) team Cairns Taipans, which an­nounced the sign­ing of the 21-year-old on a two-year deal.

Lewis, a 6'8″ for­ward, spent the past two sea­sons with the South East Mel­bourne Phoenix and was se­lect­ed 60th over­all in the 2026 NBA Draft by the Mil­wau­kee Bucks.

Lewis will open the 2026/27 sea­son as a draft-and-stash play­er while the Mil­wau­kee Bucks hold on to his NBA rights.

The Mil­wau­kee Bucks ac­quired the draft rights to Lewis from the Wash­ing­ton Wiz­ards in a three-team deal in­volv­ing the Or­lan­do Mag­ic.

This marked Lewis's third at­tempt at en­ter­ing the NBA Draft. In 2024, he worked out for the LA Lak­ers and New York Knicks but was not se­lect­ed for the Draft. The fol­low­ing year, he en­tered the Draft process again be­fore with­draw­ing to con­tin­ue his de­vel­op­ment.

Lewis, who plays for­ward, av­er­aged 7.3 points, 4.4 re­bounds, 2.0 as­sists and 1.1 steals in 31 games for the South East Mel­bourne Phoenix last sea­son.

Lewis, a na­tive of San Fer­nan­do, be­gan his pro­fes­sion­al ca­reer in Spain's Liga ACB league in 2021, play­ing two sea­sons with Balon­ces­to Fuen­labra­da be­fore lat­er com­pet­ing with Mex­i­co City Cap­i­tanes in the NBA G League and South East Mel­bourne Phoenix in Aus­tralia's NBL.