A rising basketball star from Richmond is currently playing for Canada in the FIBA U16 Americas Women's Championship in Mexico.
McMath secondary student Marina Radocaj flew out with the 12-player squad last week before their first game on Monday against Brazil, which they won, 82-56, with Marina scoring eight points.
As well as suiting up for her country and high school team, Marina plays for the local VK Basketball Club.
All of the games in Mexico can be watched on FIBA YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtInrnU3QbWqFGsdKT1GZtg.
"After a year and a half of Zoom meetings and virtual camps, it’s been an exciting week of training and getting to know each other on and off court," said Canada’s U16 head coach Cheryl Jean-Paul.
"This group has proven to be quite resilient with how they’ve had to adapt to not having the normal pathway to this tournament, so we are very thankful to be heading to Mexico and very excited to represent Canada at the FIBA U16 Americas Women's Championship."
The team held a selection/training camp at Humber College in Etobicoke from Aug. 10-19 before departing for Mexico.
The eight participating teams in the FIBA U16 Americas Women's Championship have been divided into two groups (A and B) of four teams each. Each team will play against all other teams in its own group (a total of 3 games for each team).
Canada is in Group A and with Brazil, Costa Rica (August 24, 12:30 p.m. ET) and Puerto Rico (August 25, 12:30 p.m. ET).
Canada has medalled in every edition of the bi-annual event dating back to the 2009 championship, while their highest finish was a historic gold medal at the 2015 event.
