Imagine going to another country and representing your nation at one of the highest level of competition. That’s the experience junior guard Marissa Kastanek had the luxury of enjoying her first experience with the USA Basketball program at the Pan-American Games in Guadalajara, Mexico from Oct. 21 to 25.
Team USA went 1-2 in the preliminary round and finished 7th in the tournament by defeating Jamaica in its last game, 87-41. Kastanek scored three points and dished out five assists in that game.
Kastanek came off the bench for the United States and averaged 5.8 points per game for the tournament. She also ranked second on the team in 3-point field goal percentage at .37, going 6 of 16 from the arch.
According to Kastanek , she learned about the idea of coming to a new team and learning a new system in a short period of time during the team’s training camp in Houston.
“It was a great experience, just to get to Houston for training camp,” Kastanek said. “I’ve never been in a training camp. I had three days to learn about my 11 other teammates and my three coaches. It helped me learn the style of coming to a team real quick and trying to get a common goal very quickly.”
In Mexico, Kastanek enjoyed the experience of playing on the international stage.
“When we went to Mexico just the experience of playing international basketball was amazing,” Kastanek said. We played against the national teams for all these other countries and it was a great experience to say ‘wow, I’m really playing for the United States.’
“It was a great atmosphere in the gym. It was always full and it was always really loud. They were really excited to be there. “
According to head coach Kellie Harper, she hopes to see that Kastanek has matured from this experience over the course of the season.
“Hopefully Marissa learned basketball,” Harper said. “I’m hoping this did a little maturing for her game. Sometimes to appreciate what you have you have to experience something different. I’m happy that she had that experience to go and represent Team USA.”
Even though most would consider this a business trip, according to Kastanek she was also able to explore the city of Guadalajara.
“It was cool to experience a mariachi band, they were awesome,” Kastanek said. “Then we went into this little street strip and went to all of these little shops.
“People would just come up to you and ask ‘hey, do you want some tequila?’ They were making it on the sidewalk and it was cool to see them chop up this thing and put it in this machine. “
Even though the team had to deal with her being absent during that period of training and competing, according to Harper and Kastanek , both believe that this experience has brought Kastanek closer to her team and was emphasized by a warm welcome home from her teammates.
“It’s nice to have her back home and her teammates are excited to have her too,” Harper said. “That alone does wonders when you feel wanted.”
“I really missed my teammates a lot,” Kastanek said. “I really missed all of the inside jokes we had and team chemistry we have here that we’ve built over the past three years.
“I came in the gym and they were learning our defense so they really couldn’t really say much. When they broke from that and went to get water they all came to the scorers table and said ‘Oh my god, we miss you.’ It was fun.”
