(Los Angeles) Five months after her nightmare ended, Brittney Griner, detained for 10 months in Russia, became a basketball player again with the Phoenix Mercury on Friday to a standing ovation in the season opener WNBA in Los Angeles.
“You have to get back to work and know how to put everything aside,” said Griner, about the emotions that crossed her during this moment as solemn as warm, at the microphone of ESPN, which broadcast this match live.
The Crypto.com Arena, certainly sparse, but where Kamala Harris was present, was indeed not going to fail to reserve such a welcome for Griner, on the occasion of this meeting marking a return to normal for the star, double champion Olympic with Team USA in 2016 and 2020.
PHOTO ASHLEY LANDIS, ASSOCIATED PRESS
US Vice President Kamala Harris attended the game marking Brittney Griner’s return to play.
“Thank you for everything you did to support Brittney, because I know it was rough. It was very difficult for you, because a team is a team — it’s family,” the vice president told the Mercury players she visited in the locker room.
The last time Griner walked on a North American league floor was on October 17, 2021, in Game 4 of the finals loss to Chicago Sky. That is 579 days.
As for his previous match in competition, it dated back 474 days in the Russian championship, with Ekaterinburg.
The pivot was arrested in February 2022 at a Moscow airport with a vaporizer and liquid containing cannabis, a product banned in Russia. She was about to draw for the Yekaterinburg team during the American offseason.
“A day of joy”
In August, she was sentenced to nine years in prison and then, after her appeal was rejected, was transferred in November to a penal colony in central Russia.
Brittney Griner was finally exchanged in December for Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout, a prisoner in the United States.
Over the past five months, she has been training and preparing to become the dominant insider she once was. And for this recovery match finally largely lost (94-71) by her team against the Los Angeles Sparks, she more than convinced, finishing as top scorer (18 points at 7/9 on shots, 6 rebounds, 4 blocks).
PHOTO ASHLEY LANDIS, ASSOCIATED PRESS
With each of her actions, fans of both teams loudly encouraged the 32-year-old player, who is also a figure in the LGBT + community.
“It’s a day of joy,” said Phoenix coach Vanessa Nygaard in her pre-match speech. “Throughout last season, I started every press conference by reminiscing how many days she had been gone. And until the day we found out she was about to come home, no one thought it was going to happen. »
“It was heavy every day. But it’s great to have this game today. It’s a miracle that she’s here, and everyone who attends this game today will witness a miracle: she came back from a Russian prison and is playing basketball in the WNBA again. It was through the strength and willpower of so many people that this happened,” she added.