South Carolina women's basketball shares universal language of joy at clinic in Paris

PARIS — No one on the South Carolina women's basketball roster knows any French, but you wouldn't have known watching the players interact with the 52 participants during Saturday's Under Armour youth clinic at Halle Georges Carpentier Arena.

Freshman Sahnya Jah shared a leaping embrace with her shuttle line after they finished first in a dribbling drill. Senior center Kamilla Cardoso — who is Brazilian and speaks Portuguese as her first language — was bubbling with enthusiasm guiding the French middle schoolers through cones as they practiced ball-handling, and she emerged from a group cheer flexing and stomping in pure excitement.

The Gamecocks even ended up in a dance circle with the kids, chanting and waving them on as "Teach Me How to Dougie" and Lil Uzi Vert's "Just Wanna Rock" blasted over the arena speakers.

"One thing that's universal is laughter, and all I heard was joy and laughter (today)" said Ayana Duncanson, who leads collegiate sports marketing for Under Armour. "It's like, joy and laughter and music and dance, it doesn't matter what language you speak. It was really cool to see that come through, despite differences in age, race, background, ethnicity, and play itself out on the basketball court. That's the genesis of sport and why we do what we do. I was kind of getting teary-eyed."

Cardoso remembers participating in similar clinics growing up in Montes Claros, Brazil. She said she always looked up to the older girls and wants to inspire the next generation of international athletes.

"It's great to be out there and see how happy they are and help them improve. At some point in my life I was a kid and looked up to other people, so it's really nice to be out here as someone they can look up to," Cardoso said. "I always looked up to the older girls from my country, and it was very inspirational in making it to this point."

The clinic, which precedes No. 4 South Carolina's season opener against No. 10 Notre Dame at Halle Georges on Monday (1 p.m., ESPN), was more than a year in the making. It was collaboration between Under Armour, which is the equipment sponsor for both athletic departments, Complete Sports Management which facilitated the trip, and Paris Basketball, the local professional club that facilitates much of the city's youth basketball programming.

Duncanson found out the Gamecocks were heading to Paris well before the game was publicly announced while working with former star Aliyah Boston on a marketing campaign in the late summer of 2022. She immediately got in touch with the higher-ups at Under Armour to figure out how the company could get involved.

"It was a brain trust of maybe three or four women in the organization who knew this was a really big moment and wanted to do something to celebrate it," Duncanson said. "Each of these individual coaches and programs have really built the sport (of women's basketball) and have put it on a whole new level of entertainment. As a brand, that's important for us to recognize."

Mandiaye Ndiaye, a managing partner at the sports consulting firm that works with Paris Basketball and CSM, said the clinic was a huge opportunity to develop interest in women's basketball at a grassroots level. Basketball fandom is slowly growing in France — Victor Wembanyama and Marine Johannès have elevated the French game in the NBA and WNBA respectively — and Ndiaye said events like the clinic help build passion for the sport at an early age.

"When you bring in something like this at the grassroots level, it is something really special for these kids," Ndiaye said. "When we mention that these are top players, all these kids think, they are very, very good players and I want to be like that. This is the kind of event that will grow women's basketball in Paris, and that's very important."

For the Parisian children, the American basketball they have long watched on television came to life in front of them during the clinic. Ndiaye said he was jealous watching the young athletes interact with South Carolina and Notre Dame players, because those opportunities did not exist when he was growing up.

"It's a really unbelievable moment, and it's nice to see all the kids smiling," Ndiaye said. "It's not about the language. You have an emotional connection with the girls. They know the same songs, the same dances. You don't need to know English, French. It's about basketball. We play basketball all the same."

Follow South Carolina women's basketball reporter Emily Adams on X @eaadams6 and subscribe to The Greenville News for exclusive coverage of the Gamecocks in Paris: https://subscribe.greenvilleonline.com/offers.

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This article originally appeared on Greenville News: South Carolina women's basketball inspires at youth clinic in Paris