The final moment of Su Byrd’s career was fixed on September 7, 2022. The Seattle Storm score she led was 1-3 lost to Las Vegas trump card and stopped at the WNBA semi-final. The veteran who is about to turn 42 will also bid farewell to the stadium. It was also a failure in the semi-finals. This time there was no Diana-taolexi booing with the audience shouting “One more year”, the greatest female point guard in history went to the dressing room channel with the praise of “Thank you Sue.
Su-Byrd retired
In 1980, Su-Byrd was born in seoster, Long Island, New York. Her father was a Russian Jew, and her family’s surname was “Boorda”. In 2006, she also became an Israeli citizen. Su liked to participate in various sports activities when he was young, and chose basketball under the influence of his sister. She was already playing in AAU league in the sixth grade. It was rumored that she was signed by the security guard at the door at the age of 11 because of her excellent skills when she was young.
Interestingly, because the name is the same as that of Celtics and the color of the two people is similar, people often ask her if she is a relative of Larry Bird when she was a child. And suye jokingly replied, “Yes, I have an uncle named Larry who plays in NBA……”. However, the two didn’t meet for the first time until they cooperated to shoot advertisements a few years ago. Suye confessed their story of “Fox false and Tiger Wei” in person, while Big Bird himself responded with a smile that “it is a great honor to be a member of your family”.
Big Bird and Su-Bird
It turns out that Sue’s “Uncle Larry” was not recognized in vain, and her basketball talent was also incomparable: She won numerous awards in New York state in high school and was favored by women’s basketball famous schools Connecticut. In her four-year career at the University of Connecticut, she won two NCAA championships and left various records, such as 585 assists in the second young pioneer team history, the first young pioneer team history in three-point shot percentage (45.9%) and the proud record of 114 wins and 4 losses in college career. Among them, one of the most famous is that he won the championship with 39 wins and 0 losses in his fourth year. It was also here that Su-bird got to know his good friend and later became Diana taolexi of the evergreen tree of WNBA.
In 2002, the Seattle Storm team selected Su-Byrd with the No. 1 sign. And the first All-Star teammate in her career was the number one in the previous year, and also the women’s basketball Australian celebrity Lauren Jackson who was very familiar with Chinese fans. WNBA is different from NBA. Except for overseas players, players under NCAA system must play 3-4 years of college league before they can participate in the draft, therefore, the gap between NCAA women’s basketball and occupational women’s basketball will be slightly smaller, which also means that the WNBA has a high rank, and most people have strong potential and combat capability. Su Byrd was their representative. Su in the rookie year was already the first defender of the team. She played 32 games in the season with 14.4 points and 6 assists on average, and it entered the All-Star starting in the first year. The team also won 7 more games than last season and successfully entered the playoffs.
Su Byrd and Lauren Jackson
Su Byrd has been wearing No. 10 jersey since she was young, and her career is just 10 years as a watershed. In the first decade, she fought side by side with Lauren Jackson. They hardly missed the playoffs. They won more than 50% of the regular season for 9 consecutive years and won the championship in 2004 and 2010. Suye has been an All-Star 7 in this 10 years and has become one of the best defenders in this league.
At the critical moment, suye was trustworthy, and she also contributed a lot of shots in her career: for example, she killed her hometown New York 3 points in Madison Garden in 2007; in the semi-finals of the 2010 playoffs, Mercury was defeated by the key three points in the second game; In the final game of the finals, the Atlanta Dream was Lore in the last 2.6 seconds. The constitution of this kind of “big scene lady” has actually been revealed from the University: at the Grand East championship in 2001, Connecticut of Su-Bird met with the University of Notre Dame, the strong enemy. She first hit the super-far whistle three points in half, and then transported to the front court in the last 5 seconds of the game, and immediately killed the opponent. Later, someone specially published a book called “Bird at the Buzzer” for this competition “.
With the retirement of Lauren Jackson, Su Byrd’s career ushered in the second “decade”. In this decade, she suffered knee injuries and surgery and missed the whole 2013 season. The team was also depressed for several consecutive years. WNBA entered the “Minnesota era”, the most shining person in this period is super star Maya Moore. Fortunately, Seattle people didn’t wait too long. In 2015 and 16, the two champions brought them “Golden Mamba” Zhu-Lloyd and Brianna Stewart, the strongest player of WNBA in active service.
By 2018, the storm introduced the current Han Xu’s teammate, Natsha Howard, from Tigercat. The latter broke out this season, and this time the reinforcement sent the Storm team directly to the first position in the league, the team defeated the Washington mystery man led by Elena Dele-donne 3-0 in the finals and successfully won the third championship in young pioneer team history.
Su Byrd
In 2020, the outbreak also affected the start of WNBA. Finally, like NBA, WNBA completed this season in “bubble. However, the Storm team seized the opportunity and swept through the championship without the trump card of cambich and plam under the condition of neat personnel.
When he became WNBA ace four, Su-bird was 40 years old. She can still compete with young people on the court or even play the whole game. Although she has long-term knee injuries, she has been playing in the floor since the beginning of her career. The attacking end mostly depends on shooting and seldom fights. Her main responsibility is to series the team. However, Seattle Storm, as a strong defensive team, has also deliberately arranged a weaker match for Su in recent years. The use of “saving flow” and the maintenance of her body in the second half of her career have kept her good competitiveness.
Unfortunately, no one can race against time. The return after the end of the 2021 season may be due to the regret of being infected by the audience. Stewart missed the playoffs due to injury, the announcement of “retirement after the end of the season” in the 2022 seasons was a real determination for Su to say goodbye to the stadium.
Su Byrd
Coincidentally, the last series of her career may indicate that she “should end here”: the last 3 seconds of the third series, su-bird hit 3 points directly after receiving the ball at the bottom line, and the Storm team exceeded 2 points, which was her big heart for 20 years. However, the game with only one second left was not over. The ATO cleverly designed by Becky Harmon brought the game to the plus time, while the storm of the Plus time was obviously physically exhausted and taken away by the Trump card; The fourth game of the series, stewart and Lloyd jointly scored 71 points, but opposite the victory, the medieval defender Chelsea-Grey and the new generation defender Jack Yang, who scored 25 points in the fourth quarter, after repeated strong attacks, people can only sigh that “new people in the floating world change old people”.
Su, who had 8 points, 8 assists and 4 mistakes, had a good chance in the last 5 seconds arch top receive the ball, but she passed the ball without even looking at RIM. This time maybe as the fans joked, “Sue would be better if he made more shots”. After all, in this position, Seattle’s 10th also created many miracles. Maybe this is the kind of “traditional defender” that people say is reserved for “shooting”.
Su Byrd
Looking back at Su Byrd’s career, her final regret did not affect her greatness. Her 20-year career made her have a number of data accumulation to the first place in history, she was also selected into the 13 all-star lineup and the 8 WNBA team. She was not only a “natural winner” in WNBA, but also won five Olympic gold medals and four FIBA World Cup championships in the national team, only she and Dorothy completed this achievement in the gold medals of the 5 Olympic Games. And in overseas league matches, Su-Byrd also has five Champions League titles and two awards for European all-stars. If it weren’t for the few personal honors and the average data, the best in the women’s basketball th history might have lost suspense long ago. But if you want to choose the best “court commander” and “team leader” in history, Su-bird has no right.
At the end of this year’s regular season, Su Byrd once made a small speech. She once said, “the team lost the first game I just came here, after the game, I came to the Wild Rose Bar and met a fan. She said to me, ‘Wow, maybe you shouldn’t have come here. ‘I replied politely. Thank you, but deep down I know where I should be”.
Whether it is “Wild Rose bar” or “Seattle”, she has been sticking to it for 20 years. It’s time to take off the jersey and give it to the next young defender in Seattle.
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(Text/ncll)