Portland Fire GM Vanja Černivec on Bridget Carleton: "She's gonna be our number one pick"
Moments after selecting the first eleven players in the history of Portland's new professional women's basketball franchise, general manager Vanja Černivec spoke with ESPN's Malika Andrews.
Today marked a historic day for women’s basketball in Portland, but it had a familiar feel for Vanja Černivec.
Before she became the general manager of the Portland Fire, Černivec served as the vice president of last year’s WNBA expansion darlings in the Bay Area, the Golden State Valkyries. In that role, she oversaw an expansion draft which laid the foundation for the most successful expansion season in league history.
In a 1-on-1 interview with ESPN personality Malika Andrews, Černivec discussed her second ever expansion draft, the return of professional women’s basketball to the Rose City, the significance of first pick Bridget Carleton, and more.
When asked about Minnesota Lynx small forward Bridget Carleton, who broke out over the past two seasons thanks to dependable defense and a fiery hot 44% three point shooting clip, Černivec flashed a wide grin.
“With Bridget, the strategy was ‘Who was an unrestricted free agent that just immediately stood out?‘ and then the strategy went ‘How do we make sure that she ends up on our roster?’, and the obvious logic was she’s gonna be our number one pick. Bridget is someone that - number one - everybody wants to play with. Her character speaks for herself. What she brings on the court on both ends of the floor, it’s something that’s hard to find in a player. We’re very excited to see her excel defensively, but also kind of stretch the floor and play modern, team-oriented basketball on the offense.”
Later, Andrews asked Černivec about what this day meant for Portland. The ESPN host understood the significance of the question - Andrews studied at the University of Portland before her meteoric rise through national media - and the Fire’s general manager responded with appreciation for the Rose City.
“The community is so excited to have the team back. They deserve a good product on the floor. I just can’t wait to live through the first game at Moda, and I have a feeling we’re going to be a very tough arena to play in. Our goal is to be basically for teams to just hate playing in Moda, and we challenge the [Golden State] Valkyries’ fans and the community in the Bay when it comes to that.”
Černivec, head coach Alex Sarama, and the Fire will now turn their attention to the league’s amateur draft scheduled for April 13th on ESPN. In the first round, Portland is scheduled to pick 7th. Following a pick swap with the Chicago Sky, which guaranteed that Portland would not select any Chicago players in today’s expansion draft, the Fire will pick again at 17th overall in the second round.
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Matt Bagley is a professional sports journalist with a passion for women’s sports. Outside of work, he cherishes quality time with his birth family, his chosen family, and one very pesky house panther.
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