“She wants to be a part of this like no one else,” Brittney Griner’s best friend explains why she is still absent from the public
On Tuesday morning, Brittney Griner sent a text message to her good friend Diana Taurasi, asking how the USA Basketball training camp was going.
Griner was back in Arizona. She skipped the camp in Minnesota so she could be with her wife and heal from her time in a Russian jail. After an exciting prisoner swap in December, she went back to the U.S.
Taurasi said, “She wants to be a part of this like no one else.” So, she will get there in the end. She’ll get back on her feet.”
Taurasi said that she and Griner talk often now that she is back in Phoenix. They go to the gym together and talk and text each other a lot.
“We’ve worked out together on the court. Taurasi said, “We’ve sat down and talked for hours.” “It’s been great to see you again. I like seeing her smile. Good idea to hug her. Know she was still alive and could still be grateful and happy.”
During Griner’s ordeal in Russia, which lasted 10 months, Taurasi, who is 40 years old, wasn’t sure if she would ever see her friend again.
“Every day we suffered and hoped she’d come back, but I didn’t really believe it until I saw her. And just seeing her smile and knowing she was free made everyone cry,” Taurasi said. “At the same time, we knew that as soon as she got on that plane and we got to Phoenix, BG would face a whole new set of problems, a whole new reality, and a whole new way of living her life.”
Griner has said that she will play for Phoenix again this season, even though she is still a free agent who has not signed a contract. She hasn’t talked about whether or not she will play for the U.S. at the Olympics in Paris next year. She has already helped the United States win two gold medals at the Olympics.
USA Basketball coach Cheryl Reeve said on Monday that she hasn’t talked to Griner yet, but the organization made it clear that she could take all the time she needed to decide if she wanted to play for the U.S. again.
Reeve said, “We’ve missed her, and when she’s ready to come back, we’ll be glad to see her again.”
