Bird to be a flag bearer for Team USA
Uconn basketball legend competing in Games for fifth time
Uconn women’s basketball legend Sue Bird will add another impressive honor to her list of career accolades, as she was selected as one of Team USA’S flag bearers for the Opening Ceremony of the Tokyo Olympic Games, the United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee announced Wednesday morning.
Bird, who will be participating in her fifth Olympics, will join baseball player Eddy Alvarez in representing the U.S. delegation.
“I wasn’t anticipating this, totally unexpected,” Bird told reporters Wednesday. “I think it’s a moment that, not that you don’t carry gold medals with you forever, you do, but there’s something about being a flag bearer that I think is this lifelong memory that I’ll always have, and not many people get to claim that.”
The four-time WNBA champion and nine-time Olympic and World Cup medalist, the most of any basketball athlete in the world, will become the second U.S. women’s basketball player flag bearer alongside current head coach Dawn Staley (2004).
Bird, who was on that 2004 U.S. Olympic team, got to watch Staley up close in that Opening Ceremony in Athens and still cherishes that moment as one of her favorite Olympic memories. Now, she’ll get the chance to do the same.
“We’re both point guards, and generally speaking point guards are leaders of teams’ point guards are the ones that are supposed to be selfless and help the team function properly and help others be great,” Bird said. “So to have two people who played the position in the ways that we did be selected to also lead the entire U.S. delegation into the Opening Ceremony, there’s something there that’s always going to connect us.”
According to USA Basketball, the flag bearers are voted on by a representative from each Team USA sport. Prior to the postponement of the
Tokyo Games, the International Olympic Committee changed its policy to allow each country to select two flag bearers to promote gender parity.
Bird, 40, and teammate Diana Taurasi are in the hunt to become the first basketball Olympians to win five gold medals.
“[With] the Olympics, you think about how difficult it is to just get here, how difficult is to win,” Bird said. “And I think what I embody is someone who has been able to stay at that high level for a very long period of time. I think there’s something that athletes respect about longevity, because they all know how hard it is to stay on top of your game.
“So I think they see that within me and then what I hope they see is just someone who is a leader, is selfless, tries to play the right way and tries to win, period, no matter what it takes.”
The Opening Ceremony will air live on NBC at 6:55 a.m. ET Friday., which will be followed up by a primetime presentation at 7:30 p.m. ET. The U.S. women’s basketball Olympic team kicks off its slate of games Tuesday at 12:40 a.m. ET against Nigeria.