Liz Cambage
Elizabeth Folake Cambage[1] (born 18 August 1991) is an Australian professional basketball player who last played for the Los Angeles Sparks of the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA). Cambage currently holds the WNBA single-game scoring record with her 53-point performance against the New York Liberty on 17 July 2018.[2]
Cambage with the Las Vegas Aces in 2019 | |
| Personal information | |
|---|---|
| Born | 18 August 1991 London, England |
| Nationality | Australian |
| Listed height | 6 ft 9 in (2.06 m) |
| Listed weight | 222 lb (101 kg) |
| Career information | |
| High school | Padua College (Mornington, Victoria) |
| WNBA draft | 2011 / Round: 1 / Pick: 2nd overall |
| Selected by the Tulsa Shock | |
| Playing career | 2007–present |
| Position | Center |
| Number | 1 |
| Career history | |
| 2007 | Dandenong Rangers |
| 2007–2008 | Australian Institute of Sport |
| 2009–2012 | Bulleen Boomers |
| 2011 | Tulsa Shock |
| 2012–2013 | Zhejiang Chouzhou |
| 2013 | Tulsa Shock |
| 2013–2014 | Beijing Great Wall |
| 2015–2016 | Shanghai Swordfish |
| 2017–2018 | Melbourne Boomers |
| 2018 | Dallas Wings |
| 2018–2019 | Shanxi Flame |
| 2019, 2021 | Las Vegas Aces |
| 2020 | Southside Flyers |
| 2022 | Los Angeles Sparks |
| Career highlights and awards | |
| |
| Stats at WNBA.com | |
Medals | |
She played for the Australia national team, the Opals, between 2009 and 2021, winning a gold medal in the 2018 Commonwealth Games, silver in the 2018 World Cup, and bronze in the 2012 Olympics.
Early life
Cambage was born on 18 August 1991[3][4] in London to a Nigerian father and Australian mother. Her parents separated when Cambage was three months old and she moved to Australia with her mother. First settling in Eden in New South Wales, the family moved to Melbourne when Cambage was 10 years of age and later the Mornington Peninsula.[5][6]
Cambage is 2.03 metres (6 ft 8 in) tall.[4][7][8] She was teased about her height in school. At the age of ten she was 1.83 m (6 ft 0 in) tall, reaching 1.96 m (6 ft 5 in) by the time she was 14. She started playing basketball at her mother's suggestion when she was 10 as a way to make friends.[6]
Professional career
Cambage plays at the center position in basketball.[4][9] In 2009, she played in the Under-20 Australian National Championships,[10] and the ABC suggested she could be the next Lauren Jackson.[6] The only international players surpassing Cambage in height at the time were Margo Dydek, at 2.18 m (7 ft 2 in), and Sue Geh, at 2.05 m (6 ft 8+1⁄2 in) tall.[11]
WNBL
Cambage played her junior basketball with Dandenong Rangers, joining their WNBL team for the 2007–08 season. In 2007, she accepted a scholarship to the Australian Institute of Sport (AIS),[12][13] and played for the AIS team, based in Canberra, in the Women's National Basketball League (WNBL), for the remainder for the 2007–08 season and the following one[6][12][14] In August 2020, Cambage made her return to the WNBL, signing with the Southside Flyers for the 2020–21 season.[15]
WNBA
In March 2011, Cambage expressed a reluctance to play for the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA) team that drafted her, the Tulsa Shock, stating, "I don't want to play at Tulsa, I've made that clear. They want to make me a franchise player, but I'm not going to the WNBA for that. I'm going there to learn and improve my game. But what can you do?"[16] She played in the 2011 WNBA All-Star Game.[17]
After the 2012 Summer Olympics, Cambage was due to head back to the United States to complete the WNBA season with the Tulsa Shock, but announced on the morning her flight was due to leave, 27 August 2012, that she would not be returning to finish the 2012 season. Her agent released a statement saying she was exhausted after playing for the national team.[18]
Cambage returned to play for the Shock for the 2013 season, but did not return to the WNBA for five years after.[19] In February 2018, she signed a multi-year contract with the Dallas Wings.[20]
China
In June 2012, Cambage signed with Zheijang Chouzhou basketball club in China, reportedly for a salary of $400,000 (Australian dollars), which made her one of the highest-paid female basketballers in the world.[21] Yet in an article in the Australian newspaper The Age published on 8 March 2019, Cambage bemoaned being poorly compensated and unable to meet her mortgage payments, noting that she had not been paid since September 2018 after an injury prevented her from playing in China. She was quoted as saying: "It's funny, we make all these sacrifices for our nation, but are we getting looked after properly at the end of the day?"[22]
Return to WNBA
In February 2018, Cambage signed a multi-year contract with the Dallas Wings.[23] On 17 July 2018, in a game against the New York Liberty, Cambage scored a WNBA record 53 points. The Wings won the game, 104–87.[24] Cambage was voted into the 2018 WNBA All-Star Game, making it her second all-star appearance. Following her 53-point performance, she scored 35 points in a 90–81 victory over the Washington Mystics making it the highest two-game point total in league history.[25] By the end of the season, Cambage led the league in scoring and the Wings finished with a 15–19 record as the number 8 seed in the league. In the first-round elimination game, the Wings lost, 101–83, to the Phoenix Mercury.
On 22 January 2019 Cambage requested a trade from the Wings.[26] On 16 May 2019 she was traded to the Las Vegas Aces. During the 2019 season, Cambage was voted into the All-Star Game, making it her third all-star appearance. At the end of the season, the Aces finished 21–13 and the number 4 seed, receiving a bye to the second round. In the second-round elimination game, the Aces advanced to the semi-finals after defeating the Chicago Sky, 93–92, off a play by teammate Dearica Hamby in which she came up with a steal and nailed a desperation three-pointer from half court. In the semi-finals, the Aces' playoff run came to an end as they were defeated by the eventual champions, the Washington Mystics, in four games.
On July 5, 2020, it was announced that Cambage would sit out the 2020 WNBA season due to health concerns and preexisting risk factors surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic after an evaluation by the team doctor.[27][28] Without Cambage, the Aces finished the season 18–4 with the number one seed in the shortened 22-game season, they reached the Finals but were swept by the Seattle Storm. On 23 May 2021, during a game against the Connecticut Sun, the opposing coach Curt Miller lobbied the referee for a foul call on Cambage, while hyperbolically claiming Cambage was "300 pounds". Cambage responded with a post on Instagram, calling out Connecticut Sun coach Curt Miller calling him a "little white man".[29]
Cambage signed with the Los Angeles Sparks in 2022. On July 26, 2022, Cambage was released by the Sparks on an according "contract divorce".[30]
Cambage, on August 15, 2022, announced her retirement from the WNBA. Her retirement came three weeks after she was released by the Sparks.[31][32]
National team career
In 2009, Cambage was a member of the Australian junior women's national team that won a gold medal at the Oceania World Qualification series,[33] and a silver medal at the William Jones Cup in Taiwan.[33] The following year, she was a member of the Australian junior women's team that competed at the World Championships in Thailand.[34]
Her first call up to the senior national side was in 2008,[7] and she had her first cap for the Australian Opals in 2009 in a test series against China,[35] went she played in the third game in the series.[36] On 2 September 2009, she played in the Canberra hosted return game against New Zealand in the Oceania Championship,[37] and she was a member of the Australian senior women's team that won a gold medal at the Oceania World Qualification Series.[33] She was a member of the national team again in 2010.[38] In June 2010, she was viewed by national team coach Carrie Graf as one of a quartet of strong players that would represent Australia in a tour of China, the United States and Europe.[39] In 2010, she participated in the Salamanca Invitational Basketball Tournament in Spain. Her team beat Spain 85–64. They also beat the United States. She scored 20 points in the game against Spain.[40]
In 2010, she was a member of the senior women's national team that competed at the World Championships in the Czech Republic.[7][34] She was important to the team's success.[6][41] In July 2010, she participated in a four-day training camp and one game test match against the United States in Connecticut,[39] but missed the Olympic qualification series in July 2011 because of WNBA commitments.[17] Nonetheless, she was named to the 2012 Australia women's national basketball team.[42]
In February 2012, she was named to a short list of 24 eligible players to represent Australia at the 2012 London Olympics.[4] In late April and early May 2012, she was one of four Australian "big" players to participate in a special training camp for the team,[8] and participated in the national team training camp held from 14 to 18 May 2012 at the Australian Institute of Sport.[41] Cambage was seen as a key component if Australia was to beat the United States in London.[43] At the 2012 Olympic Games on 2 August, Cambage successfully dunked the basketball with one hand in a 70–66 victory over Russia. Cambage and the Opals won a bronze medal in London with an 83–74 win over Russia.
Just before the 2014 World Championships, she ruptured her Achilles tendon, causing her to miss eight months of playing time.[44]
At the 2016 Olympics in Rio, she was the leading scorer and rebounder for the team that reached the quarterfinals.[45] She was also part of the Australian team that won gold at the 2018 Commonwealth Games.[44]
Misconduct
Cambage was named to the national team for the Tokyo Olympics but withdrew from the team in July 2021, less than two weeks before the tournament. She stated this was due to mental health issues.[46][47] In May 2022, reports alleged that Cambage had racially taunted players on the Nigerian team during a pre-Olympics training game, calling the players "monkeys" and telling the Nigerian players to "Go back to your Third World Country".[48][49] She was later found to have elbowed and slapped players on the Nigerian team, causing the training game to be called off.
Statistics
| Legend | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| GP | Games played | GS | Games started | MPG | Minutes per game | RPG | Rebounds per game |
| APG | Assists per game | SPG | Steals per game | BPG | Blocks per game | PPG | Points per game |
| TO | Turnovers per game | FG% | Field-goal percentage | 3P% | 3-point field-goal percentage | FT% | Free-throw percentage |
| Bold | Career high | ° | League leader | ||||
WNBA
Regular season
| Year | Team | GP | GS | MPG | FG% | 3P% | FT% | RPG | APG | SPG | BPG | TO | PPG |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2011 | Tulsa | 33 | 11 | 20.0 | .511 | .000 | .794 | 4.7 | 0.5 | 0.8 | 0.9 | 2.3 | 11.5 |
| 2013 | Tulsa | 20 | 16 | 25.0 | .561 | .000 | .776 | 8.3 | 1.1 | 0.5 | 2.4 | 3.1 | 16.3 |
| 2018 | Dallas | 32 | 32 | 29.5 | .589 | .324 | .738 | 9.7 | 2.3 | 0.4 | 1.6 | 2.7 | 23.0° |
| 2019 | Las Vegas | 31 | 29 | 25.3 | .499 | .167 | .753 | 8.1 | 2.1 | 0.5 | 1.5 | 2.2 | 15.8 |
| 2021 | Las Vegas | 25 | 24 | 23.8 | .543 | .357 | .710 | 8.2 | 1.5 | 0.7 | 1.6 | 1.8 | 14.2 |
| 2022 | Los Angeles | 25 | 24 | 23.4 | .509 | .286 | .784 | 6.4 | 2.1 | 0.6 | 1.6 | 2.3 | 13.0 |
| Career | 6 years, 3 teams | 167 | 137 | 24.5 | .539 | .280 | .758 | 7.5 | 1.6 | 0.7 | 1.6 | 2.4 | 15.8 |
Playoffs
| Year | Team | GP | GS | MPG | FG% | 3P% | FT% | RPG | APG | SPG | BPG | TO | PPG |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018 | Dallas | 1 | 1 | 35.0 | .500 | .000 | .667 | 12.0 | 6.0 | 0.0 | 3.0 | 3.0 | 22.0 |
| 2019 | Las Vegas | 5 | 5 | 30.6 | .549 | .500 | .871 | 11.4° | 2.0 | 1.2 | 1.8 | 2.6 | 23.6 |
| 2021 | Las Vegas | 5 | 3 | 20.0 | .488 | .500 | 1.000 | 5.4 | 1.8 | 0.2 | 1.6 | 3.4 | 10.4 |
| Career | 3 years, 2 teams | 11 | 9 | 26.2 | .525 | .444 | .851 | 8.7 | 2.0 | 1.4 | 1.2 | 2.2 | 17.5 |
WCBA
Regular season
| Year | Team | GP | GS | MPG | FG% | 3P% | FT% | RPG | APG | SPG | BPG | TO | PPG |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2012–13 | Zhejiang | 30 | – | 23.6 | .785 | 1.000 | .798 | 11.1 | 0.9 | 0.9 | 2.5° | 3.1 | 36.2 |
| 2013–14 | Beijing | 30 | – | 23.2 | .742 | .222 | .808 | 9.7 | 1.8 | 1.1 | 1.3 | 3.0 | 31.7 |
| 2015–16 | Shanghai | 31 | – | 20.6 | .698 | .304 | .827 | 11.7 | 1.6 | 1.1 | 1.8° | 3.7 | 26.4 |
| Career | 3 years, 3 teams | 91 | – | 22.4 | .741 | .303 | .810 | 10.8 | 1.4 | 0.8 | 1.9 | 3.4 | 30.5 |
See also
References
- ^ GRO Register of Births 1991 15 151 SOUTHWARK - Elizabeth Folake Cambage, mmn=Cambage
- ^ "Cambage scores WNBA-record 53 points for Wings over Liberty". ESPN. Retrieved 17 July 2018.
- ^ . WNBL.com.au. Archived from the original on 13 November 2013. Retrieved 1 May 2012.
- ^ a b c d . Official Site of the 2012 Australian Olympic Team. Australian Olympic Committee. 16 February 2012. Archived from the original on 24 April 2012. Retrieved 2 May 2012.
- ^ . The Vine. 11 March 2011. Archived from the original on 22 March 2012. Retrieved 11 April 2011.
- ^ a b c d e "Behind the News – 17/08/2010: Next Big Thing". Australian Broadcasting Corporation. 17 August 2010. Retrieved 7 May 2012.
- ^ a b c "Cambage's tall order". The Canberra Times. 24 March 2012. Retrieved 1 May 2012.
- ^ a b "Opals, Graf think big". The Canberra Times. 2 May 2012. Retrieved 7 May 2012.
- ^ Smith-Gander, Diane, ed. (2011). "Bulleen Boomers; Official Programme". IiNet WNBL Finals Series (2010/2011 ed.). Basketball Australia: 4–5.
- ^ Brad Graham Creative, ed. (2012). "On the Rise; Official Event Program". Play up (19–25 February ed.). South Melbourne, Australia: Basketball Australia: 16.
- ^ Kasmarik, Morgan (15 October 2009). Towering Cambage on the up and up. ABC Grandstand Sport. Retrieved 6 September 2012.
- ^ a b Australian Institute of Sport; Basketball Australia (2011). AIS Basketball 2011. Canberra: Australian Sports Commission. p. 59.
This is a booklet published by the Australian Sport Commission, has a copyright notice on the page following the cover page.
- ^ . Ausport.gov.au. Archived from the original on 12 February 2014. Retrieved 11 May 2012.
- ^ . Player profile. Women's National Basketball League. Archived from the original on 13 November 2013. Retrieved 11 April 2011.
- ^ Liz Cambage signs with Southside Flyers, returns to WNBL
- ^ Bernard, Grantley (31 March 2011). "Liz Cambage keen to get WNBA show on the road". Herald Sun. Retrieved 11 April 2011.
- ^ a b . Wwos.ninemsn.com.au. Archived from the original on 24 July 2011. Retrieved 8 May 2012.
- ^ WNBA: Liz Cambage Will Not Return to Tulsa Shock For the Remainder of the 2012 Season
- ^ "Voepel: Cambage's return to WNBA brings tempered expectations". ESPN. Retrieved 5 October 2017.
- ^ Liz Cambage ends five-year break from WNBA
- ^ "Liz Cambage the next Great Wall of China". Herald Sun. 24 June 2012. Retrieved 24 June 2012.
- ^ Robinson, Georgina (7 March 2019). "'I couldn't pay my mortgage': How Liz Cambage was pushed to the limit". The Age. Retrieved 8 March 2019.
- ^ "Dallas Wings sign Liz Cambage". WNBA.com. 5 February 2018. Retrieved 5 February 2018.
- ^ "New York Liberty @ Dallas Wings". wbna.com. WNBA. 17 July 2018. Retrieved 17 July 2018.
- ^ BASKETBALL Cambage breaks WNBA's two-game scoring record with 88 points
- ^ Liz Cambage Reportedly Requests Trade from Dallas Wings
- ^ Las Vegas Aces star Liz Cambage to sit out 2020 WNBA season
- ^ Aces expect superstar Cambage to sit out 2020 season
- ^ "WNBA star Liz Cambage branded racist on Twitter for calling coach 'little white man'". tech-gate.org. 25 May 2021. Retrieved 25 May 2021.
- ^ "Los Angeles Sparks Agree to Contract Divorce with Liz Cambage".
- ^ "Former Sparks star Liz Cambage steps away from WNBA 'for the time being'". The Washington Post.
- ^ "Liz Cambage will 'step away' from WNBA following Sparks exit to focus on 'healing and personal growth'". sports.yahoo.com. Retrieved 27 August 2022.
- ^ a b c Australian Institute of Sport; Basketball Australia (2011). AIS Basketball 2011. Canberra: Australian Sports Commission. p. 46. This is a booklet published by the Australian Sport Commission, has a copyright notice on the page following the cover page.
- ^ a b Australian Institute of Sport; Basketball Australia (2011). AIS Basketball 2011. Canberra: Australian Sports Commission. p. 45. This is a booklet published by the Australian Sport Commission, has a copyright notice on the page following the cover page.
- ^ . Wwos.ninemsn.com.au. Archived from the original on 22 December 2014. Retrieved 9 May 2012.
- ^ "Opals limp to decider with China". Retrieved 13 November 2013.
- ^ "Opals side selected to take on Kiwis". Nine MSN. Archived from the original on 9 December 2012. Retrieved 8 May 2012.
- ^ . Wwos.ninemsn.com.au. Archived from the original on 14 March 2010. Retrieved 9 May 2012.
- ^ a b . Wwos.ninemsn.com.au. Archived from the original on 22 July 2015. Retrieved 8 May 2012.
- ^ "Opals down Spain in final tune-up". Wwos.ninemsn.com.au. Archived from the original on 30 December 2012. Retrieved 8 May 2012.
- ^ a b "AUS — Opals announce training camp squad". FIBA. Retrieved 6 May 2012.
- ^ "Basketball Australia : 2012 Squad". Basketball Australia. 2012. Retrieved 1 May 2012.
- ^ "Lauren Jackson says others must fill void left by injured Penny Taylor". The Daily Telegraph. Australia. Retrieved 5 May 2012.
- ^ a b "Basketball | Athlete Profile: Elizabeth CAMBAGE - Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games". results.gc2018.com. Retrieved 25 September 2021.
- ^ "Fiba women's basketball Australia - 2016 Rio".
- ^ "Opals Named for Tokyo 2020 Australian Olympic Team".
- ^ "Australian and WNBA star Liz Cambage withdraws from Olympics, citing mental health".
- ^ "Liz Cambage responds to claim she told rival: 'Go back to your third world country'". News.com.au. Retrieved 10 May 2022.
- ^ "Gaze fumes at 'disgusting' new Cambage claim". wwos.nine.com.au. Retrieved 10 May 2022.
External links
- Elizabeth Cambage at FIBA
- Elizabeth Cambage at the Australian Olympic Committee ()
- Elizabeth Cambage at Olympics.com
- at Olympic.org (archived)
- Liz Cambage at Olympedia
- at Olympics at Sports-Reference.com (archived)
- Liz Cambage at IMDb