Courtney Vandersloot (born February 8, 1989) is an American and Hungarian

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball (approximately in diameter) through the defender's h ...

point guard for the Chicago Sky of the

Women's National Basketball Association The Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA) is an American professional basketball league. It is composed of twelve teams, all based in the United States. The league was founded on April 22, 1996, as the women's counterpart to the Natio ...

(WNBA) and for Sopron Basket in the Hungarian National Championship. The third selection in the 2011 WNBA draft, she was selected as an All-Star and named to the All-Rookie Team in her rookie year. She was named an All-Star again in 2019 and 2021. She led the WNBA in assists in 2014 and for five consecutive seasons during 2017–2021, and holds the all-time WNBA records for most assists in a season (300), highest assists-per-game in a season (9.1), and highest career assists-per-game (6.2). She led the Sky to their first WNBA Championship in 2021. During her college career at Gonzaga University, she was the only women's player in

West Coast Conference The West Coast Conference (WCC) — known as the California Basketball Association from 1952 to 1956 and then as the West Coast Athletic Conference until 1989 — is a collegiate athletic conference affiliated with NCAA Division I consisting of ...

history to be named the conference's player of the year three times, and also the only player to be named MVP of the WCC women's tournament three times. In her final season at Gonzaga, she won the Frances Pomeroy Naismith Award as the top

NCAA Division I NCAA Division I (D-I) is the highest level of intercollegiate athletics sanctioned by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) in the United States, which accepts players globally. D-I schools include the major collegiate athleti ...

women's player no taller than 5'8" (1.73 m) and the prestigious

Nancy Lieberman Award The Nancy Lieberman Award, named for Basketball Hall of Fame legend Nancy Lieberman, was given annually by the Rotary Club of Detroit in the Award's first 14 years to the nation's top collegiate point guard in women's Division I basketball. Sue Bi ...

as the top player at her position in Division I women's basketball. Vandersloot is also the first Division I player, male or female, to have accumulated 2,000 points and 1,000 assists in a career.

Early life

Born in the

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a port, seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the county seat, seat of King County, Washington, King County, Washington (state), Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in bo ...

suburb of Kent, Washington to parents who both worked for

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, Vandersloot grew up in a neighborhood with many children her age, and said in a 2011 interview that "all we did was play sports, all sports." Her father built a sports court with a basketball goal behind the family house, but she almost never played there, choosing instead to play at a hoop in front of a neighbor's house where she could easily be seen by other children in the neighborhood. She regularly played against boys. During the third grade, she wrote a school paper about her dreams of one day playing in the WNBA. While Vandersloot regularly played basketball and many other sports as a child—she was also on a

fast-pitch Fastpitch softball, also known as fastpitch or fastball, is a form of softball played by both women and men. While the teams are most often segregated by sex, coed fast-pitch leagues also exist. Fast pitch is considered the most competitive fo ...

softball team that was runner-up in a Washington state tournament at age 11— her favorite sport was soccer; she had a poster of

Mia Hamm Mariel Margaret Hamm-Garciaparra (; born March 17, 1972) is an American retired professional soccer player, two-time Olympic gold medalist and two-time FIFA Women's World Cup champion. Hailed as a soccer icon, she played as a forward for the ...

on her bedroom wall. She did not concentrate on basketball until high school:

High school

Vandersloot became a basketball star at Kentwood High School in her hometown. Her coach, Keith Hennig, a former player at

Central Washington University Central Washington University (CWU) is a public university in Ellensburg, Washington. Founded in 1891, the university consists of four divisions: the President's Division, Business and Financial Affairs, Operations, and Academic and Student Lif ...

who is 6 inches taller than Vandersloot, regularly played one-on-one against her either before or after the team's practice. He would later say, "I did not take it easy on her at all. I was more physical than anything she's ever been used to. At times, I wasn't too nice. I would ride her and foul her. I'd put my hand in her face and she would whine and complain about fouls. I'd say, 'There's no fouls out here.' " She eventually reached the point where she regularly beat her coach off the dribble. A pivotal moment in her life came during the summer before her sophomore year, when she went with a friend to the Gonzaga University girls' basketball camp. She would say about the trip in 2011, "I just fell in love with this place. I felt so comfortable here." The Gonzaga women's basketball staff was equally enthusiastic about her, except for head coach

Kelly Graves Kelly Lee Graves (born January 14, 1963) is the current head women's basketball coach at the University of Oregon. Previously, Graves was the head women's basketball coach at St. Mary's from 1997 to 2000, as well as Gonzaga University from 2000 to ...

, who had little opportunity to see her during the camp. Graves would finally get to see Vandersloot at length in her junior year, on the day before the 2006 Washington Class 4A state tournament. He offered her a

scholarship A scholarship is a form of financial aid awarded to students for further education. Generally, scholarships are awarded based on a set of criteria such as academic merit, diversity and inclusion, athletic skill, and financial need. Scholarsh ...

after seeing her practice, even though he did not stay for the tournament. That season, she had averaged more than 18 points and 7 assists as she led Kentwood to its first state tournament appearance; they would lose in the second round of the tournament to Spokane's University High, led by future

Tennessee Tennessee ( , ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked state in the Southeastern region of the United States. Tennessee is the 36th-largest by area and the 15th-most populous of the 50 states. It is bordered by Kentucky to ...

star Angie Bjorklund. After that season, Vandersloot was asked by many people if she would consider Washington or another Pac-10 school, but decided against it after a Pac-10 assistant told Hennig she was too small. She would eventually

sign A sign is an Physical object, object, quality (philosophy), quality, event, or Non-physical entity, entity whose presence or occurrence indicates the probable presence or occurrence of something else. A natural sign bears a causal relation to ...

with Gonzaga in November 2006, during her senior year at Kentwood; she noted in 2011, "I wasn't really being highly recruited and I just didn't want to go through the stressful recruiting process, so I committed early to Gonzaga." Vandersloot took her game to another level as a senior, averaging 26 points, 7 assists, 5 rebounds, and 5 steals while leading Kentwood to a third-place finish in the state tournament; their only loss was in the state semifinals. She scored 113 points in the tournament, one shy of the state record for a girls' tournament, and was named MVP. Vandersloot was also consensus first-team all-state, and was named the state's player of the year by the ''

Seattle Times ''The Seattle Times'' is a daily newspaper serving Seattle, Washington, United States. It was founded in 1891 and has been owned by the Blethen family since 1896. ''The Seattle Times'' has the largest circulation of any newspaper in Washington s ...

''. Vandersloot was rated as the No. 64 national prospect, and No. 35 among guards, by ''Scout.com''.

College career

By her own admission, Vandersloot came to Gonzaga as a shy freshman. During that first season, Graves suggested that she call the school's greatest point guard in history for advice— Hall of Famer John Stockton. Vandersloot would recall that it "took me a couple of weeks to build up," and when she finally called Stockton for the first time, she hoped that she would reach his voice mail so she wouldn't have to talk. Vandersloot eventually worked with Stockton throughout her Gonzaga career. As a freshman in 2007–08, she was the

newcomer of the year and named to the 10-member All-WCC first team after averaging 10.3 points, 5.7 assists, and 1.9 steals per game entering the WCC tournament, finishing in the top five in the WCC in the latter two categories while the Zags went 13–1 in conference play and earned the tournament's top seed. However, the Bulldogs lost in the WCC final to

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and ultimately missed out on the NCAA Tournament, playing instead in the WNIT. They defeated

UC Davis The University of California, Davis (UC Davis, UCD, or Davis) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university near Davis, California. Named a Public Ivy, it is the northernmost of the ten campuses of the Uni ...

in the first round before falling to

Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the wes ...

in the second round. In her 2008–09 sophomore season, she set a school record in assists with 239; at the end of the regular season, her average of 7.3 per game led the conference, and she was also third in the conference in scoring at 16.4 per game. Vandersloot won the first of what would be three WCC Player of the Year awards. The Bulldogs went on to win the WCC tournament, with Vandersloot named tournament MVP. In the NCAA tournament, the Zags defeated Xavier for the program's first NCAA Tournament win before narrowly losing in the second round to

Pitt Pitt most commonly refers to: *The University of Pittsburgh, commonly known as Pitt, a university located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States **Pitt Panthers, the athletic teams of the University of Pittsburgh * Pitt (surname), a surname o ...

. As a junior in 2009–10, Vandersloot led Division I in assists, averaging 9.4 per game, while leading the Zags to an unbeaten record in conference play. During that season, she broke her own school record for assists in a season with 321, and also broke the Gonzaga and WCC records for career assists. Vandersloot was again named both WCC Player of the Year and WCC Tournament MVP while leading the Bulldogs to a second consecutive WCC Tournament title. In the NCAA tournament, Vandersloot led the Zags one round farther than in 2009, upsetting No. 2 seed (and 2011 champion) Texas A&M before losing in the Sweet Sixteen to the Xavier team they had knocked out the year before. Her senior year at Gonzaga, 2010–11, can be summed up as a season of milestones. She led the WCC in both scoring and assists on the way to a second straight unbeaten season in conference play. Vandersloot was named WCC Player of the Year for an unprecedented third time. The Zags again won the WCC Tournament, and Vandersloot was named tournament MVP for the third straight time, also becoming the first women's player in WCC history to win that honor three times. In the NCAA tournament, the Bulldogs were a No. 11 seed, but had the advantage of playing their first-round and potential second-round games at their home court of

McCarthey Athletic Center McCarthey Athletic Center (MAC) is a 6,000-seat indoor arena on the campus of Gonzaga University in Spokane, Washington. Opened in November 2004, it is home to the university's Bulldog basketball programs, members of the West Coast Conference (WC ...

. They would take full advantage of their home court in the first two rounds. The Zags, seeded No. 11 in their region, opened the tournament with a 92–86 upset of

Iowa Iowa () is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States, bordered by the Mississippi River to the east and the Missouri River and Big Sioux River to the west. It is bordered by six states: Wiscon ...

, with Vandersloot scoring a career-high 34 points. In their second-round game against No. 3 seed

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a Normal school, teachers colle ...

, Vandersloot finished with 29 points and 17 assists, one assist shy of the record for a Division I tournament game, as the Zags took down the Bruins 89–75. During that game, she became the first player in Division I history to amass 2,000 career points and 1,000 career assists. The win advanced them to the Sweet Sixteen for the second straight year, and to a regional tournament that would be held less than two miles (3 km) from the Gonzaga campus at Spokane Arena. During the Bulldogs' next game, a 76–69 win over Louisville, Vandersloot broke the Division I women's record for assists in a season previously held by

Suzie McConnell Suzie McConnell-Serio (born July 29, 1966) is a former American women's basketball coach and player. She was the head coach for the women's basketball team at the University of Pittsburgh from 2013 to 2018. In 2004, she was named WNBA Coach of t ...

. She finished with 29 points, 7 assists, and 7 steals as the Zags became the lowest-seeded team ever to reach a regional final in the women's tournament. Their tournament run, and Vandersloot's college career, would end one game later as

Stanford Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

would defeat the Zags 83–60. While she finished with 25 points, only four came in the second half. In addition to her other milestones during the season, she also broke the Gonzaga single-season scoring record. Vandersloot became one of the most decorated players of the 2010–11 season. She won the women's Frances Pomeroy Naismith Award as the top Division I player no taller than 5'8" (1.73 m), and the

as the top point guard in Division I women's basketball. She was also named to multiple All-America teams. The AP named her a second-team All-America; she became the first women's player in WCC history to be named to that specific team. She also was named to the five-woman Wooden All-America Team, another honor never before achieved by a WCC player. Finally, she was named to the 10-player USBWA All-America team, becoming the first Gonzaga player so honored, and the 10-member State Farm Coaches All-America team, another first for a WCC player. Her impact on the Gonzaga program can be measured by another statistic—home attendance. The year before she arrived in

Spokane Spokane ( ) is the largest city and county seat of Spokane County, Washington, United States. It is in eastern Washington, along the Spokane River, adjacent to the Selkirk Mountains, and west of the Rocky Mountain foothills, south of the Canada ...

, the Bulldogs averaged 1,492 with a team that would make its first NCAA tournament appearance. By her junior year, attendance had risen to 2,935, and rose again to 3,824 in her senior season, with the Zags selling out the McCarthey Athletic Center twice before the NCAA tournament.

College awards and records

* Frances Pomeroy Naismith Award (2011) *

(2011) *3× WCC Player of the Year (2009–2011) *3× WCC women's tournament MVP (2009–2011) *4× All-WCC (2008–2011) *WCC Newcomer of the Year (2008) *

2009 NCAA Women's Basketball All-Americans 9 (nine) is the natural number following and preceding . Evolution of the Arabic digit In the beginning, various Indians wrote a digit 9 similar in shape to the modern closing question mark without the bottom dot. The Kshatrapa, Andhra and ...

(honorable mention, AP) *

2010 NCAA Women's Basketball All-Americans The following are the First, Second, and Third Team selections by the Associated Press. First team *Maya Moore, Connecticut Huskies women's basketball, Connecticut, 6-0, Junior *Tina Charles (basketball), Tina Charles, Connecticut, 6-4, Senior *K ...

: **Honorable mention, AP **Honorable mention, State Farm Coaches' *

2011 NCAA Women's Basketball All-Americans Eleven or 11 may refer to: *11 (number), the natural number following 10 and preceding 12 * one of the years 11 BC, AD 11, 1911, 2011, or any year ending in 11 Literature * ''Eleven'' (novel), a 2006 novel by British author David Llewellyn *''El ...

: ** Wooden All-America **State Farm Coaches' ** USBWA **Second team, AP NCAA records: * First

player of either gender with 2,000 points and 1,000 assists * Most assists in a season, Division I (367)

Professional career

WNBA

Vandersloot was widely considered to be one of the top prospects in the 2011 WNBA draft. Her relatively small size had been a subject of concern, as was her defense—despite averaging 4.5 steals per game in the 2011 NCAA tournament and ending her Gonzaga career with 366. However, she was seen as likely to be one of the top seven picks, and was ultimately picked third overall by the Chicago Sky. One indicator of her likely draft position was that

Indiana Fever The Indiana Fever are an American professional basketball team based in Indianapolis, playing in the Eastern Conference in the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA). The team was founded before the 2000 season began. The team is owned ...

coach Lin Dunn, whose team needed depth at point guard going into the 2011 season, signed Shannon Bobbitt in February, convinced that Vandersloot would be picked before the Fever's turn at #9. John Stockton gave Vandersloot high praise, stating, "I don’t want to dramatize it too much but she’s like Gretzky in hockey. There is something that separates Courtney from others." In her rookie season, she became the Sky's regular starter at the point, ultimately starting 26 of the team's 34 games. Her average of 3.7 assists per game (apg) was 11th in the league and second among rookies. She was also named as an Eastern Conference reserve for the 2011 WNBA All-Star Game, and was one of the five members of the 2011 All-Rookie Team, gaining 10 of a possible 11 votes from the league's head coaches. She became a regular starter for the Sky in subsequent seasons, and helped lead the team to the 2014 WNBA Finals against the

Phoenix Mercury The Phoenix Mercury are an American professional basketball team based in Phoenix, Arizona, playing in the Western Conference in the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA). The team was founded before the league's inaugural 1997 season ...

in her fourth season, but the Sky were swept 3–0. The 2014 season also marked the first time Vandersloot led the league in assists per game (5.7). In the 2015 season, Vandersloot led the league in assists total assists (but came in second in assists-per-game to Candace Parker). In the 2017 season, she led the league in assists for the second time in her career, setting the single-season league record for assists per game at 8.1 apg and the record for most assists over a 15-game stretch with 149. However, despite these efforts, the Sky finished 12–22, missing out on the playoffs for the first time in four years. In the 2018 season, Vandersloot broke the single-season record for assists and finished off the season with 258 assists and her own assists per game record with 8.6 apg. On July 20, 2018, Vandersloot became the seventh player in league history to post a triple-double, she scored 13 points along with 10 rebounds and a career-high 15 assists in a 114–99 victory over the

Dallas Wings The Dallas Wings are an American basketball team based in Arlington, Texas. The Wings play in the Western Conference in the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA). The team is owned by a group which is led by chairman Bill Cameron. Gre ...

. She also averaged a career-high in scoring. Despite these performances, the Sky missed out on the playoffs yet again, they finished 13–21. In the 2019 season, Vandersloot continued to exceed assists records. She broke her own league record with 9.1 assists per game. She was selected to the 2019 WNBA All-Star Game, making it her second All-Star appearance. Her season performance would help the Sky return to the playoffs with a 20–14 record, earning the number 5 seed. In the first-round elimination game, the Sky defeated the

105–76 to advance. In the second-round elimination game, the Sky were defeated by the Las Vegas Aces 93–92 after a late game desperation half-court shot by Dearica Hamby. In the 2020 season, the season was shortened to 22 games in a bubble at

IMG Academy IMG Academy is a preparatory boarding school and sports training destination in Bradenton, Florida, United States. IMG Academy is set across over 600 acres and features programs consisting of sport camps for youth athletes, adult camps, a boar ...

due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identified ...

. Vandersloot would average a career-high in scoring and once again set a new record for assists per game with 10, while playing and starting all 22 games. The Sky finished as the number 6 seed with a 12–10 record, but were eliminated by the

Connecticut Sun The Connecticut Sun are an American professional basketball team based in Uncasville, Connecticut that competes in the Eastern Conference (WNBA), Eastern Conference of the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA). The team was established ...

in the first round elimination game. In the 2021 season, Vandersloot started all 32 games for the Sky and once again led the league with 8.6 assists per game. The Sky finished the season as the sixth seed with a 16–16 record, but went on to a successful run in the playoffs, winning two single-elimination games and a semifinals series against the first-seeded

to reach the Finals for the first time since 2014. In the

2021 WNBA Finals The 2021 WNBA Finals, officially the WNBA Finals 2021 presented by YouTube TV for sponsorship reasons, was the best-of-five championship series for the 2021 season of the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA). The finals featured the f ...

, Vandersloot recorded 12.5 assists and 11.5 points per game, as the Sky defeated the Phoenix Mercury in four games to win their first championship. Across the 10 games in the 2021 postseason, she recorded 10.2 assists and 13 points per game.

European leagues

In 2011, she signed with the

Turkish Turkish may refer to: *a Turkic language spoken by the Turks * of or about Turkey ** Turkish language *** Turkish alphabet ** Turkish people, a Turkic ethnic group and nation *** Turkish citizen, a citizen of Turkey *** Turkish communities and mi ...

club

Beşiktaş Beşiktaş () is a district and municipality of Istanbul, Turkey, located on the European shore of the Bosphorus strait. It is bordered on the north by Sarıyer and Şişli, on the west by Kağıthane and Şişli, on the south by Beyoğlu, and ...

. Because the WNBA season is held in the northern hemisphere summer, the traditional offseason for basketball throughout the world, many of the league's players participate in overseas leagues during the traditional season and return to their WNBA teams in the summer. In February 2022, after the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, she left UMMC Ekaterinburg in the

Russian Women's Basketball Premier League The Russian Women's Basketball Premier League is the premier women's basketball competition in Russia. The category consists of 11 teams playing a total of 20 rounds. At the end of the regular season the top eight teams play the play-offs througho ...

. In April 2022, she joined Hungarian club Sopron Basket for the 2022–23 European season.

Personal life

On December 27, 2018, Vandersloot married Chicago Sky teammate Allie Quigley in Seattle, near Vandersloot’s hometown of Kent, Washington.

Career statistics

College

, - , align="left" , 2007–08 , align="left" ,

Gonzaga Gonzaga may refer to: Places * Gonzaga, Lombardy, commune in the province of Mantua, Italy * Gonzaga, Cagayan, municipality in the Philippines *Gonzaga, Minas Gerais, town in Brazil *Forte Gonzaga, fort in Messina, Sicily People with the surna ...

, 34 , , 27 , , 28.3 , , .412 , , .330 , , .654 , , 3.9 , , 5.6 , , 1.8 , , 0.2, , 3.0 , , 10.6 , - , align="left" , 2008–09 , align="left" ,

, 32 , , 31 , , 32.8 , , .468 , , .376 , , .787 , , 4.1 , , 7.5 , , 2.2 , , 0.3 , , 3.8 , , 16.4 , - , align="left" , 2009–10 , align="left" ,

, 34 , , 34 , , 32.6 , , .472 , , .346 , , .746 , , 3.8 , , 9.4 , , 3.6 , , 0.6 , , 4.3 , , 14.1 , - , align="left" ,

2010–11 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number representing a single or the only entity. 1 is also a numerical digit and represents a single unit of counting or measurement. For example, a line segment of ''unit length'' is a line segment of length 1. I ...

, align="left" ,

, 36 , , 36 , , 32.9 , , .486 , , .378 , , .831 , , 3.7 , , 10.2 , , 3.2 , , 0.3 , , 3.3 , , 19.8 , - , align="left" , Career , align="left" , 4 years, 1 team , 136 , , 128 , , 32.9 , , .463 , , .358 , , .769 , , 3.8 , , 8.2 , , 2.7 , , 0.3 , , 3.3 , , 11.8