INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana Fever guard Tiffany Mitchell is one of 22 top players who have been invited to participate in the USA Basketball Women’s National Team training camp, scheduled for Feb. 9-11, 2018, at the University of South Carolina. Included on the list are 16 members of the 2017-20 USA National Team and an additional six athletes, including Mitchell, who were invited to participate by the USA Basketball Women’s National Team Player Selection Committee in hopes of being named to the USA National Team pool.
The USA will train at 10 a.m. (EST) on Feb. 9-10 and 9 a.m. (EST) on Feb. 11 at the Carolina Coliseum.
“I’m excited any time that we can get together with USA Basketball and have a training camp that assembles some of the best players in the country,” said Dawn Staley, USA National Team and University of South Carolina head coach. “It’s always a great thing. It gets your basketball wheels moving. It’s less than two weeks away, and all of Columbia is excited to have our USA Basketball training camp here.”
For Mitchell it marks a return to her college alma mater where she played for Staley and helped South Carolina to the its first NCAA Final Four in 2015. Since her graduation in 2016, Mitchell has starred for Indiana while averaging 9.3 points per game over two seasons. A member of the WNBA All-Rookie Team, she set a Fever free throw mark as a rookie with 42 consecutive free throws and 91 percent free-throw shooting overall. She broke her own record with 43 straight free throws last year and was averaging 10.3 points per game at the time of a knee injury that cost her the final three weeks of the season. Her 91.6 career throw percentage (186-of-203) already is the best in Fever history.
Participation with USA Basketball is not new to the Fever star. As part of a USA Basketball Select Team, Mitchell trained with the USA Basketball Women’s National Team prior to the 2016 Olympics, and participated in a Women’s National Team mini-camp in 2015. She has taken part in USA Basketball events since 2010 and earned a silver medal with the U.S. in the Pan Am Games in 2015.
The February minicamp features 16 members of the 2017-20 USA Basketball Women’s National Team pool, including Sue Bird (Seattle Storm); Tina Charles (New York Liberty); Layshia Clarendon (Atlanta Dream); Elena Delle Donne (Washington Mystics); Skylar Diggins-Smith (Dallas Wings); Stefanie Dolson (Chicago Sky); Brittney Griner (Phoenix Mercury); Tiffany Hayes (Atlanta Dream); Jewell Loyd (Seattle Storm); Angel McCoughtry (Atlanta Dream); Maya Moore (Minnesota Lynx); Nneka Ogwumike (Los Angeles Sparks); Kelsey Plum (Las Vegas Aces); Diana Taurasi (Phoenix Mercury); Morgan Tuck (Connecticut Sun); and Courtney Williams (Connecticut Sun).
Attending the camp as USA National Team hopefuls are: Mitchell, her former South Carolina teammate Allisha Gray (Dallas Wings); Chelsea Gray (Los Angeles Sparks); Brittney Sykes (Atlanta Dream); Sydney Wiese (Los Angeles Sparks); and Elizabeth Williams (Atlanta Dream).
Members of the USA National Team pool who are unavailable to participate in the February camp are: Seimone Augustus (Minnesota Lynx); Napheesa Collier (University of Connecticut); Asia Durr (University of Louisville); Jantel Lavender (Los Angeles Sparks); Kayla McBride (Las Vegas Aces); Kelsey Mitchell (Ohio State University); Chiney Ogwumike (Connecticut Sun); Katie Lou Samuelson (University of Connecticut); Odyssey Sims (Los Angeles Sparks); and A’ja Wilson (University of South Carolina).
Sylvia Fowles (Minnesota Lynx) and Breanna Stewart (Seattle Storm) currently are competing in China, and their inclusion on the training camp roster will depend on their respective teams’ run in the WCBA playoffs. Lindsay Whalen (Minnesota Lynx), a member of the past two U.S. Olympic (2012, 2016) and USA World Cup (2010, 2014) gold-medal winning teams, was named to the 2017-20 USA National Team last fall. However, she has since retired from USA Basketball.