St. John's University Athletics
Udobi Teaches Basketball, Life Lessons to Nigerian Youth
2/4/2016 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
QUEENS, N.Y. - Division I basketball players at the highest level do not receive the luxury of plentiful free time. During the small window between summer sessions and the beginning of the school year, most student-athletes head home to relax and recuperate before the start of another grueling season.
Redshirt junior forward Sandra Udobi cherishes the opportunity to go home, but she returns each summer to her native Nigeria with a more humanitarian purpose in mind.
Together with her longtime friend Sarah Imovbioh, who currently plays for the undefeated South Carolina Gamecocks, Udobi runs S&S Basketball Camp, an instructional camp in the Nigerian capital that seeks to educate young girls about much more than just basketball.
If Udobi seems unusually willing to give back to young Nigerian girls yearning to learn the game, it is because not too long ago she was one of them. After picking up the game at the age of 14, Udobi quickly discovered that she had uncommon talent. Two years later, Udobi, already a member of the U-16 Nigerian National Team, was recognized at a camp and earned the opportunity to come to America and play for the Philadelphia Belles. After a successful summer on the AAU circuit, Udobi played her way into a scholarship at Life Center Academy, a private high school in Burlington, N.J. From there, Udobi impressed college coaches to the extent that she received numerous high major offers, most notably from Joe Tartamella and the St. John's Red Storm.
Udobi has been a part of more than a few successful St. John's squads since her arrival in Queens, making two trips to the NCAA Tournament and advancing to the WNIT Round of 16 in her three years as a member of the Red Storm. In addition to her prowess on the court, Udobi has also been an exemplary student-athlete off the court, consistently finding a spot on the dean's list and captaining several community services efforts with her teammates.
Despite all these efforts and accolades, Udobi knew that she still wanted to give back to the people in her homeland. Together with Imovbioh, Udobi reached out to several high schools in the Abuja area in hopes of recruiting young girls to come learn the game of basketball. Originally shooting for 30 girls between the ages of 13 and 17 to be a part of their inaugural class, the pair was delighted to see almost double that number turn out for the first day of camp.
Not only teaching the fundamentals of the game to girls that may never have had the opportunity to play, Udobi emphasizes that there is much more to the camp than just basketball.
"Everyone knows if you want to play you need to have passion for the game," said Udobi. "But there are things that they need to understand like the importance of education, your confidence, your determination, how hard you really have to work to achieve your goals."
In addition to this sage advice, Udobi also shares her personal tale and helps explain the differences between the Nigerian game and the American game, which is much more team oriented.
"Every time I talk to the girls I tell them my story," Udobi continued. "I tell them how I started, how I came here to America and how if you're not passing the ball you don't play."
Udobi took so many positive experiences from her work that she and Imovbioh are already planning this summer's second edition of S&S Basketball Camp.
Ultimately, Udobi would like the opportunity to help young Nigerian girls come to America and better their lives with basketball like she did, pointing to a few girls in the camp that she believes have the talent and work ethic to do so.
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With temperatures reaching into the upper 90s in the capital, one could think of more relaxing ways to spend a summer's day in Abuja than on a scorching blacktop surrounded by government buildings and army barracks. But for Sandra Udobi, there is no place she would rather be. Teaching the fundamentals of the game she loves and imparting life lessons that she has picked up on her intercontinental journey, Udobi hopes to nurture the next generation of Nigerian basketball stars.
