Hortência Marcari

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Hortência Marcari
Forward
Basketball Hall of Fame as player
Women's Basketball Hall of Fame
FIBA Hall of Fame as player
Medals
Women’s Basketball
Representing  Brazil
Olympic Games
Silver medal – second place 1996 Atlanta National team
World Championship
Gold medal – first place 1994 Australia National team
Pan American Games
Gold medal – first place 1991 Havana National team
Silver medal – second place 1987 Indianapolis National team
Bronze medal – third place 1983 Caracas National team

Hortência Maria de Fátima Marcari (born September 23, 1959) is a former

FIBA Hall of Fame
(inducted in 2007). She is known in her country as Hortência, and her nickname is The Queen.

Biography

Born in Potirendaba, São Paulo (state), Brazil, Hortência is of Italian background, her grandparents having moved to Brazil from that European nation. Hortência's father was a laborer.

When Hortência was ten years old, her family moved to São Paulo, and Hortência became interested in sports. Her family disapproved of her choice to play sports, since her father had been disabled on the field and they wanted her to work bringing home part of the earnings her father used to. But they eventually gave up trying to keep her from her favorite activity.

At the age of thirteen, in 1972, Hortência began to play

street basketball at her school gym. One year later, she was spotted by Waldir Paga Perez, coach of Brazil women's national basketball team
. Hortência was playing for the national team at age fifteen.

Hortência began to play as a professional with the

WNBA. Hortência was a teen idol to many female basketball fans in the cities where she played, particularly at Prudentina where, during an interview with Jeremy Larner, she was stopped many times by autograph
seekers on her way from her house to a game.

Hortência's first international experience came in 1976, when Brazil's women's national basketball team won the South American juvenile championship in

Indianapolis Pan American Games. In 1991, Hortência and the Brazilian women's national basketball team won the gold medal at that year's Pan American tournament held in Cuba. In 1992, Hortência helped her team to a bronze medal at the Pre-Olympic competition held in Spain, returning later that year to that country to play in the Olympic Games for the first time. Brazil settled for seventh place at the Barcelona Olympics
.

Finally in 1994, Hortência won the women's

world basketball championship in Australia, making Brazil the only country other than the Soviet Union
or the United States to win the title (Australia became the fourth in 2006). The semi-final game against the USA is considered one of the greatest in history, and Brazil shocked the world with the victory. After the silver medal in the next Olympic Games, Marcari retired from international competition.

Apart from those competitions, she also played in Peru, Singapore, Malaysia, Bulgaria and South Korea.

Despite the fact her team did not qualify for the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, Hortência was featured on those games' official program, in an article named The Queen.

On 5 August 2016, she became the penultimate torch bearer for the 2016 Summer Olympics torch relay, being the link between Gustavo Kuerten who brought the torch into the Olympic Stadium, and the cauldron lighter, Vanderlei de Lima, during the Opening Ceremonies.[3]

Her son,

João Victor, participated in dressage competitions at the 2016 Summer Olympics
.

See also

References

  1. ^ "WBHOF Inductees". WBHOF. Retrieved 2009-08-01.
  2. ^ "Hall of Famers". Basketball Hall of Fame. Archived from the original on 2011-02-15. Retrieved 2009-08-01.
  3. ^ "Opening Ceremony". 2016 Summer Olympics. 5 August 2016. NBC.

External links

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