Mabrey magic
Ask Rachid Meziane, who coached her at Connecticut, to describe Marina Mabrey, and he doesn’t reach for statistics.
“She’s crazy,” Meziane told CBC Sports ahead of the Tempo’s game against the Mystics. “I mean, crazy in a good way.”
It’s a description that fits. Mabrey is the kind of player who makes opponents feel her presence – and not just on the box score. She’s had run-ins with some of the best players in the game, including six-time Olympic gold medallist Diana Taurasi, seven-time All-Star Skylar Diggins, and 2024 Rookie of the Year Caitlin Clark. When she’s on a heater, she makes sure the whole building knows it. She even has a self-imposed “crashout jar” — a financial penalty she pays whenever she loses her composure on court, the proceeds going to charity.
But the emotion is inseparable from the ability. And the ability, at its peak, is something to behold.
Across the Atlantic with Italian club PF Schio during the 2022-23 European season, she scored 37 points in the title game to win the national championship and helped the club to a EuroLeague Women bronze medal in the same campaign. Back stateside, her record-breaking playoff performance against the Fever offered another exhibit in the same case. And just four months ago, playing in Unrivaled — the 3-on-3 winter league — she dropped 47 points in a single game in Philadelphia, a competition record, finishing the season as its leading scorer at 25.3 points per game.
Mabrey’s raw talent and moments of dominance on the court are there for all to see. Whether she can string them together across a full WNBA season is the question Toronto needs answered.