{"id":57332,"date":"2020-10-07T20:43:00","date_gmt":"2020-10-08T02:43:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/?p=57332"},"modified":"2021-03-05T09:23:23","modified_gmt":"2021-03-05T15:23:23","slug":"2-jewish-stars-helped-power-the-seattle-storm-to-a-wnba-championship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/2-jewish-stars-helped-power-the-seattle-storm-to-a-wnba-championship\/","title":{"rendered":"2 Jewish stars helped power the Seattle Storm to a WNBA championship"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By EMILY BURACK<\/p>\n<p>(JTA) \u2014 In a sweep, the Seattle Storm defeated the Las Vegas Aces for the 2020 WNBA championship title on Tuesday night. Instrumental in that victory were two Jewish stars: starting point guard Sue Bird and starting forward Alysha Clark.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_57333\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/10-7-20-suebird-alyshaclark-1080x600-1.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-57333\" class=\"wp-image-57333 size-medium lazyload\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/10-7-20-suebird-alyshaclark-1080x600-1-300x167.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"167\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/10-7-20-suebird-alyshaclark-1080x600-1-300x167.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/10-7-20-suebird-alyshaclark-1080x600-1-1024x569.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/10-7-20-suebird-alyshaclark-1080x600-1-768x427.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/10-7-20-suebird-alyshaclark-1080x600-1.jpg 1080w\" data-sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 300px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 300\/167;\" \/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-57333\" class=\"wp-image-57333 size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/10-7-20-suebird-alyshaclark-1080x600-1-300x167.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"167\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/10-7-20-suebird-alyshaclark-1080x600-1-300x167.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/10-7-20-suebird-alyshaclark-1080x600-1-1024x569.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/10-7-20-suebird-alyshaclark-1080x600-1-768x427.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/10-7-20-suebird-alyshaclark-1080x600-1.jpg 1080w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/noscript><\/a><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-57333\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Alysha Clark, second from left, and Sue Bird, holding the trophy, celebrate the Seattle Storm&#8217;s WNBA championship victory at the Feld Entertainment Center in Palmetto, Fla., Oct. 6, 2020. (Julio Aguilar\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Bird, who made history in Game 1 of the series with a record number of assists, became the third-ever basketball player \u2014 male or female \u2014 to win championships in three different decades. (The other two were men\u2019s basketball players Tim Duncan and John Salley.) This was the Jewish superstar\u2019s 17th season in the WNBA \u2014 and she\u2019s not slowing down anytime soon.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think the fact that I\u2019ve been able to do it in different decades, with the same franchise, not many people can say that,\u201d said Bird, who turns 40 in two weeks. \u201cTo recreate it over time and stay at a high level over time is definitely something I\u2019m proud of, because it hasn\u2019t been easy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Fellow Israeli-American basketball player \u2014 both have dual citizenship \u2014 Alysha Clark,&nbsp;33, dedicated the Storm\u2019s win to the Black women \u201cforgotten in this country.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are often overlooked and often unheard, and this championship was for them, for us,\u201d said Clark, who is Black and Jewish.<\/p>\n<p>Clark, born and raised in Colorado, researched the Jewish heritage on her mother\u2019s side of the family with a Florida rabbi to obtain Israeli citizenship and play professionally there. She played for three different Israeli teams between 2010 and 2016.<\/p>\n<p>Clark, who was raised Christian and still practices that religion, didn\u2019t know much about her Jewish heritage before playing in Israel \u2014 but she did know how to count to 10 in Hebrew, because her maternal grandparents spoke the language and celebrated some Jewish holidays.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI want to understand the language in the country I live in, to communicate with people as well as with grandpa and grandma,\u201d Clark explained at the time.<\/p>\n<p>Bird, whose father is Jewish, never played in Israel but lived there for a short time while acquiring citizenship and has talked about the experience of immersing herself in Israeli culture.<\/p>\n<div style=\"padding-bottom:20px; padding-top:10px;\" class=\"hupso-share-buttons\"><!-- Hupso Share Buttons - https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/ --><a class=\"hupso_toolbar\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" data-src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" class=\"lazyload\" \/><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\"\/><\/noscript><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">var hupso_services_t=new Array(\"Twitter\",\"Facebook\",\"Google Plus\",\"Pinterest\",\"Linkedin\",\"Tumblr\",\"Email\");var hupso_background_t=\"#EAF4FF\";var hupso_border_t=\"#66CCFF\";var hupso_toolbar_size_t=\"medium\";var hupso_image_folder_url = \"\";var hupso_url_t=\"\";var hupso_title_t=\"2%20Jewish%20stars%20helped%20power%20the%20Seattle%20Storm%20to%20a%20WNBA%20championship\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/js\/share_toolbar.js\"><\/script><!-- Hupso Share Buttons --><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":57333,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1491],"tags":[8790,8795,8788,10923,10922],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57332"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57332"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57332\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57334,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57332\/revisions\/57334"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57333"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}