Stewart\u2019s words reveal the leadership that she has displayed since Bueckers was added to the senior national team this year. Stewart, being the team\u2019s veteran leader, guided Bueckers, Caitlin Clark, and Angel Reese in their first international competition. <\/p>\n
She led the team to victory after trailing France by 14 points and winning their fifth consecutive world championship.<\/p>\n
This leadership can be traced back to 2022, when Bueckers tore her ACL. Stewart, who had sat out the whole 2019 WNBA season after rupturing her Achilles, said she felt \u201cdevastated\u201d for her.<\/p>\n
That shared experience helped Stewart understand Bueckers\u2019 healing journey well. In the 2021-2022 season with the knee injury, Bueckers had to sit out 19 games, but Stewart, who has been through similar challenges, served as an inspiration for Bueckers to get back to her best self.<\/p>\n
This is not a one-way relationship. Bueckers herself has been vocal about Stewart\u2019s influence on her game.<\/p>\n
Paige Bueckers And Kara Lawson On What Breanna Stewart Means To The Program<\/p>\n
Bueckers never denied being a fan of Stewart, as she was one ever since she joined UConn, having followed in the footsteps of the great player who paved the way almost a decade ago.<\/p>\n
In remarks about her UConn predecessor, Bueckers said, \u201cShe\u2019s the ultimate winner. She\u2019s everything that I wanted to be growing up, wanting to go to UConn, fill in her shoes. Everybody who goes to college aspires to have a Breanna Stewart career and to win four championships.\u201d<\/p>\n
U.S. coach Kara Lawson echoed that sentiment after the World Cup final. \u201cShe is USA Basketball. When you think of the last 15 years, it\u2019s Stewie,\u201d Lawson said. \u201cWe\u2019re just really lucky to be a part of her era.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her statistics certainly justify the praise. During the World Cup, Stewart won the MVP Award for the second time, averaging 12.8 points, 7.3 rebounds, and 2.8 assists per game with 55.3 field goal percentage. <\/p>\n
She has also managed to win three Olympic golds, three WNBA titles, and four NCAA titles.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Stewart\u2019s words reveal the leadership that she has displayed since Bueckers was added to the senior national team…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":895774,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[629],"tags":[49,48,82,630],"class_list":["post-895773","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports","tag-wnba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/895773","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=895773"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/895773\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/895774"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=895773"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=895773"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=895773"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}