Silvia Domínguez: "We are a benchmark for everyone, not just for them"

Silvia Domínguez (Montgat, Barcelona, ​​35 years old) was already the captain of CB Avenida when the team from Salamanca won the women's Euroleague in 2011. That success launched a legendary career forged with the character and passion of that girl who made her way in schoolyard and began shooting hoops at the age of seven, the age that his son Yago is now.

In Istanbul she faces her eighth Final Four in search of her fourth title.

“We will have to try to round up so that there are nice numbers”, she tells between jokes and truth before the semifinal this Friday against the Hungarian Sopron (4:00 p.m., Tdp).

On the other side of the table, USK Prague and Fenerbahçe (19:00, Tdp) meet.

Thirty years after the legendary Dorna Godella won the first of the four European Cups for Spanish women's basketball,

Ask.

How are your head and legs after two years of

and two stressful months of the team?

Answer.

I don't even know.

This has become pure survival.

Not only for what we have this year, but for not having rested in summer and accumulating two seasons of splicing.

And go two years.

We take it as best we can.

After each game, whether it hurts or not, I go to the

, even if it's to prevent it.

P.

In February you saw how the team was disarmed due to injuries and personal problems of several players and, even so, they qualified for this Final Four and won the Cup.

R.

Yes. Within the team we had the joke that this seemed like

, we were district 12 and we went to work every day to survive.

Everything got worse every day.

We told ourselves 'either we grit our teeth to try to get this out or we throw the season away'.

It's been hard, but when we take stock we see that everything we've been through has brought us together a lot as a team.

We are a great human group and the problems have made us stronger now that we have recovered all the pieces.

MORE INFORMATION

Silvia Domínguez: "Athletes are not protected from motherhood"

Perfumerías Avenida and the long journey of Spanish women's basketball

Q.

The basis of good leadership is humanity and you applied yourself to help your partner Kahleah Copper, who in a few days lost her brother and a cousin, and still has been with the team.

R.

He received two very hard blows and had to make two round trips to the United States in a few days.

There is a lot of talk about empathy and that is when you have to be with people and put yourself in their place.

He wondered why is all this happening to me? Am I in the right place or should I be with my family?

I wanted to convey to him that whatever decision he made, we were going to understand it.

And that, if he saw that he could and wanted to continue, we were going to become his family here.

The sport was in a second or third plane.

P.

They have made a flag of that sensitivity as a group.

R.

When the coach and the club think about which players can put together this puzzle, they look, fundamentally, at how they are as people.

As much as you can contribute on the track, if the human group does not work later, nothing is achieved.

We've been two seasons without having a single problem.

They all accept the roles and they all work for the good of the team.

That is the basis of all successes.

P.

Speaking of successes, what is it like to win at 16, when you won your first League, and now at 35?

R.

There is a part of me that thinks that I have little time left as a player, I don't know how much but little.

And that part really relishes winning a title or reaching a Final Four.

Now I am learning a lot to enjoy every moment.

You have to enjoy the journey, the processes that are experienced in the teams... that is what gives meaning and value to everything.

Q.

Your son Yago is now the age you started playing basketball.

What was Silvia like as a child?

R.

An earthquake, it did not stop still.

That's why it was 'you have to point it at something', to channel that energy.

She was a very good student and got very good grades.

I liked everything, but the hours of physical education were the best of the week.

At my son's age I was running everywhere and I never got tired... And now I'm still the same on the track.

Silvia Domínguez, in the official photo session of the Women's Euroleague.

FIBA

P.

How did your parents live when you launched a career in basketball?

R.

They always supported me, since I was little.

They sacrificed a lot of their time for something that, at the time, was just fun for me.

They never put limits on me.

Not even when decisions had to be made like going to Madrid at the age of 17, they also encouraged me, even despite themselves.

I am from a very humble family.

My parents had no relationship with sports and have had several jobs to get ahead, like many families.

That is why the support they gave me impresses me more, because there was no sports reference within the family.

They believed in that restless girl.

Q.

In addition to energy, does it take a lot of determination to break through giants and build a record like yours [with eight medals with the national team and 26 club titles]?

A.

My older brother is 1.92m tall and I grew up hoping to make the growth spurt one day, but I stuck with my 1.67m.

I thought, I am like that and he is already there, it is what it is.

Find your life to do what other players can't do and assert yourself as you are and with what you have.

And it hasn't been too bad for me.

I'm not one to look at the list of winners, but when they remind me of it, it impresses.

Q.

Your growth has gone hand in hand with that of Avenida.

In his first stage (2006-2011) he won three titles and since his return in 2015 he already has 11.

R.

It is a club that has always been faithful to its philosophy and way of doing things.

Many people think that we have big budgets here and for nothing.

It is about spinning very fine when it comes to signing.

And we are also lucky that many players want to come here to play for what this team represents.

In my first stage there was the Ros Casares, which resisted us.

On my lap, there was no longer such an abysmal difference.

Now big projects like Valencia Basket are being built, there is a very powerful Girona... And hopefully the League continues to advance like this, with the rise of Barça, with more ACB structures like the one in Zaragoza... Here in Salamanca, more than economic capacity what there is is a great capacity to reinvent ourselves, move forward and always compete.

It is a family business that is strongly committed to this and people identify a lot with our fight.

We are the resistance.

MORE INFORMATION

Perfumerías Avenida wins its tenth Copa de la Reina

Perfumerías Avenida reaches the Final Four for the second consecutive year

P.

Laia Palau used to say that among women it is frowned upon to “cock” because they have not been educated to stand out.

However, you have normalized gestures of claw and ambition, of those that are common in men.

R.

It comes to me innately, at important moments, to connect with the fans.

I feel like this and it comes out without thinking.

Q.

In your school, did the children dominate the playground?

R.

I made room for myself in the schoolyard without any problem.

I got in there to play soccer, basketball, and whatever.

Now also, the girls already have us as references, because they see us more and because fortunately this does not stop growing.

Basketball is the sport with the most female licenses in Spain [130,539, according to 2020 CSD data, compared to 77,461 for soccer].

When I go to my son's school, the children tell me: “you are better than the NBA”.

That a child tells you that speaks of what the reference of the Avenida means for the society of Salamanca.

It is significant that boys say it, not just girls.

We are references for everyone, not just for them.

P.

How was your debut in the captaincy of the national team in November after the withdrawal of Laia Palau?

R.

It was a contact of very few days.

Miguel Méndez arrived as coach and it consisted more in observing the changes and his working method… I am going to be captain in my own way and to the best of my ability.

I will be there to help everyone.

Many young people are entering and it is important to make them feel comfortable and involved.

There are players who have an incredible career and can carry the weight of the group a bit, but you have to manage that balance between the different generations.

It will also depend on Miguel's work.

I will try to be fair with all of them, empathize with each one of them, with the fixed ones and with the new ones.

Q.

With Spain out of the World Cup, will it be a quiet construction summer?

A.

Yes. We will be able to move forward without the pressure of results.

Last was a summer of great pressure in a situation that was not the best and we have to put all this back together.

That is the work that begins now.

Q.

Going back to the Final Four, without Yekaterinburg (excluded due to the sanction against the Russian teams) there are more options to bring the second Euroleague to Salamanca after that conquest in 2011.

R.

Fenerbahçe are the favourites, because of the squad they have and because they play at home with the support of their fans.

But the options have been opened for all four teams.

Hopefully at the end our

will sound at

the Ulker Arena.

Hopefully 2011 will be repeated, it was wonderful.

4️⃣ Teams.

1️⃣ Goal.

Who will be crowned #EuroLeagueWomen 2022 Champions?

🏆🔥 pic.twitter.com/e7YrdKjipk

– EuroLeague Women (@EuroLeagueWomen) April 3, 2022

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