‘I have been really blessed:’ Stamford’s Edona Thaqi lives out a dream playing basketball for Kosovo National Team

Thaqi was elevated in Stamford, together with a person sister and two brothers.

Enjoying for Kosovo would call for Thaqi to develop into dual-citizen and attain a passport from Kosovo, which requires months of function.

Thaqi was determined to make it occur.

“When you want some thing, you do whatsoever you have to do to make it happen,” Thaqi said. “I understood this would be the crowning accomplishment of my basketball career and a person of the crowning achievements of my lifetime to go back again and characterize Kosovo. It would be satisfying a aspiration for me and my mother and father immediately after they sacrificed so considerably to give me the everyday living I have listed here. It usually means so considerably to me and my household and I am so grateful that basketball has been the automobile I have rode to success.”

Luckily for Thaqi, government officers in Kosovo truly needed her on the group and assisted expedite the procedure, according to Thaqi.

Thaqi obtained her passport and was off to Kosovo to depict her new country in the 2022 FIBA Women’s European Championship for Little Nations.

She built sure her mom manufactured the excursion overseas with her.

“My dad and mom came from Kosovo with almost nothing,” Thaqi mentioned. “The power they instilled in me will under no circumstances leave me. They had no person to assist them but they did what they experienced to do for our spouse and children. I am initial technology in this state and the initially in my household to graduate from university.”

Her predicament was that she was beginning a new career functioning powering the scenes in broadcasting for the NBA and would have to have time off from her new task to go enjoy.

“I preferred to go engage in overseas but was setting up a new occupation, way too,” Thaqi said. “Fortunately, they were so interesting about it and comprehended it was a as soon as in a life span opportunity for me and let me acquire a month off from a task I was just starting off.”

She is now back again at work and will be at the NBA Summer season Leagues in Las Vegas subsequent week.

On June 2, Thaqi joined her new crew, teaching for a few weeks just before likely to the FIBA tournament in Cyprus.

Kosovo played in 4 game titles, likely 1-3.

She was the only American on the crew, generating her grateful that her moms and dads generally spoke Albanian in their household expanding up.

She stated the other players were thrilled to have a player from a United States college application with them, but Thaqi was just as a excited to sign up for them.

“It was actually neat to provide my Fordham working experience there and teach them matters I acquired together the way. This recreation has specified me so substantially and I am so joyful to be in a position to give some of that back,” Thaqi reported. “But I learned a ton from them way too about tough get the job done. Final yr there was no Kosovo Women’s National Staff. They have extremely couple of means and there is a whole lot of work to be done but this is a good get started. I seriously want to go back again in the long term and do a basketball camp for ladies there.”

Together with the basketball experience, Thaqi acquired a lot of focus for currently being an American participant enjoying for Kosovo.

She created many tv appearances, which include appearing on the major two morning demonstrates in Kosovo.

She and her mother also had the possibility to privately meet Kosovo’s Key Minister Albin Kurti.

“I never believed a thing like that would happen,” Thaqi said. “I got a textual content from his assistant and I was ecstatic. He told me how proud he was of me. Of training course, my mom imagined that was the most amazing portion of the excursion. My mom is so very pleased of me and has been there for my whole journey. From three ACL accidents to participating in at Fordham, my mom and dad have always been there for me. My mothers and fathers sacrificed so a great deal for me and to be able to do that with my mother was extraordinary.”

Thaqi tore her ACL two times in large college at Westhill and one particular additional time in college or university but in no way gave up.

This earlier wintertime she was awarded a scholarship all through her final time, the greatest honor a walk-on can obtain.

“I have been genuinely blessed,” Thaqi stated. “I am so thankful that I under no circumstances gave up. It’s all about the journey and the interactions constructed that are so significant. Getting in Kosovo, I recognized that my purpose is about so considerably far more than basketball. It truly was a crowning achievement in my lifestyle.”