On Feb, 10, 2024, Serbia beat Brazil in the FIBA Women’s Olympic Qualifying Tournament and punched their tickets to Paris. That win wouldn’t have been possible without Yvonne Anderson, the 5-foot-6 guard born in Springdale, AR who handles the playmaking duties for the White Eagles, as the Balkan team is known. In this three-part deep dive, we get into Anderson’s performance that day, explain how she got there and what made her the player and the person that she is today.
A game more specific to our family is probably a game called “Burn.” It’s American football-based, but it’s basically just like a 1-on-1 matchup along with a quarterback. You decide a route with your quarterback, someone has to play defense against you and you have four tries (or downs) to get a touchdown. We would play this growing up, usually with a bunch of disposable paper Gatorade cups we stepped on to compact them together, which allowed them to be thrown without falling apart.
With two minutes left in the first quarter, Anderson is back on the court. She picks her route, drives to the basket and gets a foul call. The Brazilians get her down, but she releases the ball in time to earn two free throws. She drains both. First down. During the next offensive possession, she’s fouled again while driving to the basket. After getting hit on the head, she is wobbly but doesn’t fall down. Again, she goes to the line, and again drains both free throws. Second down. Serbia plays tough defense and gets the steal, with Brazil barely crossing the 3-point line. The ball goes to Anderson, she takes one step inside, shoots a jumper and scores. Brazil is only up by one point. Third and inches.
The touchdown comes courtesy of Tina Krajišnik, the veteran center, who scores what will end up being her only made field goal of the game. With her back to the basket, she takes a step back and turns to release a hook shot, which puts Serbia up 21-20 with 18 seconds left in the first quarter. In the closing seconds of the quarter, Anderson manages to play quarterback for her teammates, finding Angela Dugalic with the pass. The power forward is fouled while trying to score and goes to the line. The two free throws she’ll make will end up being her only points scored in the game.
After being down by 10, Serbia won the first quarter 23-20. Twelve of those points were scored by Anderson. Hard work and patience helped her turn the quarter around, just as she was able to build an awesome basketball resume without getting drafted into the WNBA. In 2012, she didn’t expect to be picked anyway. During her senior year playing for the Texas Longhorns, she averaged 11.7 points, 5.5 assists, 3.5 rebounds and 2.7 steals per game. The stats didn’t tell the whole story, as she was wise beyond her years. How else can one can explain her decision to attend Texas, instead of heading to Missouri, where her dad was coaching the men’s team? She says:
I grew up with hall of fame coaches around me, so my decision was always going to be based on playing for a great coach. It’s the main reason I cherish the opportunity to play for great coaches still.
Goestenkors reminisces about her former point guard:
Yvonne and her family were and are very close knit. Yvonne was an outstanding student and the entire family did their homework on the schools, teams and coaches that were recruiting her. Her parents wanted Yvonne to ultimately make the decision and make her own way in the world. Although it was a tough decision, she knew it was time to leave the nest and go away to school.
Anderson claims that this decision was crucial for her future career, as she wouldn’t be as homesick when playing abroad. And at age 26, Anderson met another coach who would change her life. In 2016, Marina Maljković was coaching Galatasaray, Fenerbahçe’s local rivals, when she reached out to Anderson. Anderson had a good season playing for Pallacanestro Torino and already had agreed to stay in Italy for another year, albeit on a different team. However, her contract had a buyout clause, which the Serbian coach activated, seeing in Anderson her point guard. Maljković isn’t much of a talker, she’ll let you know what she wants from you, what you can expect from her and you either buy into that or are free to leave. There’s no shortage of those willing to be coached by Maljković. Anderson recalls:
Our first season together wasn’t necessarily rocky, I just was like most American players, any player actually, who has never played for Marina Maljković. I was unprepared for what it entailed. I was young and didn’t possess the vision that she had, and that I have grown to possess now. She saw more for me than I could imagine, even at that time, before [the] national team was ever even a thing.
Again, patience and hard work. Anderson wasn’t ready yet, but the coach knew what she was capable of. And even after Anderson left after a season for Olympiakos in Greece, the coach continued to follow her career. In 2020, Maljković finally convinced Anderson to play for Serbia. By the end of the year, the guard was playing in a 2021 EuroBasket Women qualification game against Lithuania. On the naturalization process, Anderson remembers:
It was just a lot of paperwork. I was playing in Turkey at the time I started the process, and then in Italy when it was all finished. But I’m lucky I had coaches who supported me and allowed me to travel to Serbia and finish all of the things necessary to legally gain citizenship. Realistically, that was it. Paperwork and flights. Maybe a little Marina influence, but who knows!
Maljković’s persistence was something Anderson could relate to. Having worked on her game with Mike Anderson and Gail Goestenkors, she’s not easily impressed by coaches. But she’s completely devoted to Maljković and her decision to play for Serbia had a lot to do with who coached the team. Anderson shares:
I considered it a second chance to play for my coach, to play in something most athletes will never have the chance to and I took it deeply personal as a sign of the trust she had in me. From then on, no one could or can ever question my loyalty to her. There’s not one moment I don’t believe she has my best intentions in mind, so there’s not one wall I wouldn’t run through for her if she asked me to. She challenges me, and knows that I will rise to that challenge. And that’s been our relationship. Her telling me what she expects, and me doing everything in my power to live up to those expectations.
The proof comes in the first play of the second quarter back in Belém, Brazil, when Anderson forces a charging foul against 6-foot-6 Stephanie Soares. Anderson, remember, is 5-foot-6. Three minutes later, she drives to the basket and scores on Soares, putting her team up by six points, 30-24.
Both teams are trading punches and the first half ends with Serbia up by one point, 39-38. Brazil was outrebounding Serbia and had more than twice as many assists, but Serbia had six steals to Brazil’s two. And they had Yvonne Anderson, the game’s leading scorer with 16 points.
Look for Part III of “Patience and hard work: Yvonne Anderson leads Serbia to the 2024 Paris Olympics” next week.