…Lindener looking forward to working with GABF to give back to basketball in Guyana

JOY Adams, who plays professionally in Spain in the Liga Femenina Endesa with Araski AES, is hoping to, one day, don the Guyana colours for the Guyana Amateur Basketball Federation (GABF) Internationally; something she says has been a dream of hers since stepping on to the basketball court.
Adams, 28, hails from Amelia’s Ward, Linden – Cinderella City to be exact – and wasn’t really a basketball fan though it’s among the most popular sports played by kids she grew-up with.

She was more into football but after moving to the USA, she explained that her High School coach insisted on her learning and playing the game (basketball).
Since then, basketball, Adams said, has been her ‘thing’ as she grabbed national attention while playing for Evans High School in Orlando, Florida.
She was Central Florida Athlete-of-the-Year in 2012, First Team All-Metro and Second Team All-County during her senior season and was named Florida Athletic Coaches Association 7A District 11 Player-of-the-Year.

“After high school, I had many offers to go almost any school, but I chose Iona College in New York and those coaches developed me,” Adams said in an exclusive interview with Chronicle Sport.

IONA COLLEGE CAREER
Adams went on to have a stellar National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) collegiate career as a point guard with Iona College in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC).
Adams is the MAAC’s all-time leading rebounder and Iona’s second all-time leading scorer.

She was a three-time All-MAAC First Team selection and All-MAAC Second Team and MAAC Rookie-of-the-Year as a freshman.
She was named All-MAAC Tournament Team two times and MAAC Player-of-the-week on seven occasions. Adams had 81 career double-doubles, ranking top 10 in NCAA history.
Since her college Career, Adams said she always wanted to ‘suit-up’ for Guyana’s national team, since, she said, there’s no better joy than representing your country.

“Ever since I was in college, I thought it would’ve been great to come back home and play for my country, but I didn’t get an opportunity to make it happen, but now I’m hoping it can,” Adams said.
She told Chronicle Sport that even though she’s in the United States, her “heart and soul is in Guyana. I was born here, I was raised here; just being able to put on that jersey and to show that we do have talent and we can compete with the rest of the world.”

PLAYING IN SPAIN
The Liga Femenina Endesa is the highest pro-league in Spain and the top League in Europe. It is the women’s equivalent of the men’s Liga ACB and is run by the Spanish Basketball Federation.
Adams describes playing in Spain as “amazing,” adding “Everything about it; the lifestyle, the people, the food; but the competition. It’s very competitive. It’s more systematic (basketball), It’s very methodical. It’s not really based on your athletic ability. It’s about knowing when to pass, when to drive, when to slow it down; which, mostly, that’s the difference.”

The Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA), one of the world’s popular pro-basketball leagues, isn’t all that it seems and Adams boasts about how lucky she is to head ‘overseas’ after finishing college.
“I always look at it as, the WNBA is not your final destination, because ‘overseas’ allows players like myself to have that opportunity to continue playing and have a career.

Because if overseas wasn’t there, I probably wouldn’t be playing basketball because the WNBA spots are so limited…everyone knows, there’s a lot of politics in everything, so the WNBA it’s a lot of politics. But I can tell you, that if you keep working and prove that you’re the best, now you have a seat at the table,” the point-guard opined.

She continued: “There’s stages. You have the WNBA, the Euro Cup and the Euro League. When you’re in Euro Cup and Euro League, you’re competing with all the WNBA players. So now, I play against some of the best WBA players and I’ve had some of the best WNBA players on my team; so when it’s all said and done, we’re all here, at the same place.”

Meanwhile, Adams said she’s hoping to meet with GABF president, Michael Singh, to not only represent Guyana, but work with the Federation to support women and girls in the sport of basketball locally.