April 30, 2015

COLUMBIA — University of South Carolina junior Tiffany Mitchell (Charlotte, N.C./Providence Day) was invited to attend the USA Basketball Women’s National Team mini-camp in Las Vegas May 4-6, the organization announced today. She joins recent WNBA No. 1 draft pick Jewell Loyd (Seattle Storm) and 2014 WNBA draftee Jen Hamson (Los Angeles Sparks) as additions to the camp that tips off training for the 2016 Olympic Games.

“The [Player Selection] Committee has watched these three athletes compete at a high level collegiately, and they are all talented players,” said Carol Callan, USA Basketball Women’s National Team Director and chair of the selection committee. “We are always looking toward the future, and we feel that these camps not only help USA Basketball prepare for the next big event, which of course is the Olympic Games, but for competitions beyond 2016.

“Part of our success internationally has come from evaluating and training younger athletes in settings such as this camp. While we haven’t had the opportunity to see Jen Hamson with USA Basketball, Tiffany and Jewell have won gold medals at the junior level, and based on their past experiences in college and with Jewell and Tiffany internationally, we wanted to see how they competed on the USA National Team level.”

“I’m looking forward to next week’s training camp,” said USA National Team and University of Connecticut head coach Geno Auriemma. “We are going to have a great mix of young athletes who are hungry for a spot on the team and many veterans who might need to work a little harder because of it. And of course we’re bringing in three who could shake things up … Jewell Loyd and Tiffany Mitchell are two very talented guards, who I had the opportunity to see up close in games this year. They both gave my team a tough time, and I can’t wait to see them working alongside players like Sue Bird and Lindsay Whalen.”

Mitchell capped her junior season by winning The Dawn Staley Award and becoming the first Gamecock to be named a finalist for all three national player of the year awards — The Wooden Award, The Wade Trophy and The Naismith Trophy. The two-time All-American and SEC Player of the Year was among the league’s top 10 scorers while also ranking in the top 15 in steals and assists. Her field goal and free throw percentages ranked her among the top 50 in the nation as well.

Mitchell’s previous USA Basketball experience includes a gold medal at the 2014 FIBA 3×3 World Championships and participation in the 2010 USA U17 World Championship Team Trials.

South Carolina head coach Dawn Staley will join Mitchell at the mini-camp as one of the assistant coaches named to the USA Basketball staff for the 2016 Olympic Games.

The final 12-player 2016 U.S. Olympic Women’s Basketball Team will be selected rom the 2014-15 USA National Team pool by the USA Basketball Women’s National Team Player Selection committee. Chaired by Callan, the committee includes WNBA appointees Renee Brown (WNBA chief of basketball operations and player relations), Dan Hughes (head coach and general manager of the San Antonio Stars) and Chris Sienko (vice president and general manager of the Connecticut Sun); and three-time Olympic and two-time FIBA World Championship gold medalist Katie Smith, who played in nearly 200 games for USA Basketball (1993-2008) and serves as the athlete representative.

2016 Olympic Games
The 2016 Olympic Games will be held Aug. 5-21 in Rio de Janeiro. A total of 12 nations will compete in the Olympic women’s basketball competition, including host Brazil and the USA, which earned its berth by virtue of claiming the gold medal at the 2014 FIBA World Championship. The gold-medal winning nations from each of the five FIBA zone Olympic qualifying tournaments in 2015 also will punch their tickets to Rio, while the remaining berths will be awarded to the top five finishing teams at the 2016 FIBA World Olympic Qualifying Tournament (dates and site TBD).

U.S. Olympic women’s basketball teams have earned a record seven gold medals, one silver medal and one bronze medal, and are 58-3 all-time in Olympic competition. The 2016 U.S. team will enter Rio riding a 41-game Olympic winning streak that dates back to the 1992 Barcelona Olympics bronze medal game.

Since the inception of the 1995-96 USA Basketball Women’s National Team program, the USA National Team, in addition to its record five-straight Olympic gold medals, has captured four FIBA World Championship gold medals, one FIBA World Championship bronze medal and one FIBA Americas Championship gold medal, while compiling a remarkable 86-1 record for a .989 winning percentage in those events. Further, USA National Teams in exhibition contests since 1995 boast of a 186-15 record (.925 winning percentage).

USA Basketball
Based in Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA Basketball, chaired by Jerry Colangelo, is a nonprofit organization and the national governing body for men’s and women’s basketball in the United States. As the recognized governing body for basketball in the U.S. by the International Basketball Federation (FIBA) and the United States Olympic Committee (USOC), USA Basketball is responsible for the selection, training and fielding of USA teams that compete in FIBA-sponsored international competitions, as well as for some national competitions, and for the development of youth basketball initiatives that address player development, coach education and safety.

USA Basketball men’s and women’s teams between 2012-14 compiled a spectacular 122-4 win-loss record in FIBA and FIBA Americas competitions, the World University Games and the Nike Hoop Summit, and posted a 65-8 win-loss record in official FIBA and FIBA Americas 3×3 competitions.

USA teams are the current men’s and women’s champions in the Olympics; men’s FIBA World Cup and women’s FIBA World Championship; men’s and women’s FIBA U19 and U17 World Championships; men’s and women’s U18 and U16 FIBA Americas Championships; the FIBA 3×3 Women’s World Championship; the FIBA 3×3 Women’s U18 World Championship; and the women’s Youth Olympic Games. USA Basketball currently ranks No. 1 in all five of FIBA’s world-ranking categories, including combined, men’s, women’s, boys and girls.

For further information about USA Basketball, go to the official Website of USA Basketball at usab.com, and connect with us on facebook/usabasketball, twitter/usabasketball, youtube/usab, plus.google/+usabasketball and instagram.com/usabasketball.