Uvays Akhtaev (born Uvays Mazhidovich Akhtaev 1930-1978) was a prominent basketball player, master
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of sport in the former Soviet Union. Being a 232-centimeter-high man, he was to be famed for this very sport. The central stadium in Grozny was named after him. He graduated from the Karaganda Physical Culture college and was going in for boxing, wrestling, track-and-field athletics, putting the shot and discus throwing.
As a college student Uvays Akhtaev participated in discus throwing competition at a student Olympics in the city of L’vov in 1946. But he was primarily a basketball player by birth. Isaac Camlevich was his first coach in Karaganda. In 1946 Akhtaev moved to Alma-Ata and became a member of the Kazakh team. As a basketball star he was noticed at the 1947 student Olympics. Previously the team was not successful enough, but after Uvays Akhtaev became its pivot of a phenomenal height, the team succeeded in reaching the Major League.