‘A summer full of dreams’: How three Mystics players reacted to Olympic berths

Hines-Allen has mastered the art of holding the “O” in the song’s opening line, but that’s about as far as she’s gotten, Edwards told The Next in early July.

Still, after Edwards officially made the Canadian Olympic team, Hines-Allen reveled in getting to break out the anthem.

“That was super cool that I got to sing to her actually knowing that she’s on the national team,” Hines-Allen told reporters on July 2. “… It’s super dope to have an Olympian on our team. … So just super, super proud of her.”

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But Edwards, a 6’3 forward, isn’t the only Mystic heading to Paris. Point guards Julie Vanloo (Belgium) and Jade Melbourne (Australia) were also recently named to their countries’ Olympic teams, and general manager Mike Thibault will be an assistant coach for Team USA. All four teams with Mystics representation are ranked among the top six in the world.

The Olympic berths come during a tough season for the Mystics. They have gone 6-17 and did not have any players named to Team USA or to the WNBA All-Star team. But Edwards, fellow rookie Vanloo and the 21-year-old Melbourne have given them plenty to celebrate.

“[It’s] super special,” wing DiDi Richards told reporters on Tuesday. “And it’s all either the rookies or the youngest players on the team, so it’s exciting to see them lay a foundation for themselves and lay a foundation for their career. …

“It wasn’t really a shocker, but it was exciting to celebrate. I love screaming in the locker room, so give me a reason to scream, [and] I will.”

Edwards was the first of the trio to be publicly named to an Olympic roster, on July 2. She’d received the fateful call from Canada’s coaching staff a few nights earlier and, alone in her apartment, she shed happy tears.

The Mystics celebrated Edwards in the locker room the day the roster was announced. She opened a suitcase full of Canada gear as her teammates roared their approval, then she circled the room for a victory lap of high-fives.

“It was just really cool to see her teammates react like that for her,” head coach Eric Thibault told reporters that day. “[I] think it meant a lot to her. But it was, I think, a celebration of her making the team, but just a celebration of kind of who she is. …

“Aaliyah carries herself like an Olympian. I mean, that’s just how she acts. It’s how she goes about her work every day.”

Edwards had been the youngest player on Canada’s roster at the Tokyo Olympics, which came weeks after her 19th birthday. She barely played and Canada finished ninth, but both player and team are ready for more this summer.

“Aaliyah I think has improved immensely over the years,” veteran Canada and Los Angeles Sparks guard Kia Nurse told reporters on July 5. “… Some of the stuff she does doesn’t end up on the stat sheet, but it’s the stuff that helps you win games, and so I’m glad to have that on my team. … I’m just really excited to be able to play with her.”

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“I think it’s more of a different hunger this time around,” Edwards said. “… I got older, got better, improved a lot. … So I’m just super excited for what I can bring to this team and what we’re capable of. And as I’ve been saying, our goal is [to make the] podium, and I have huge confidence in us.”

If Canada brings home that medal, it will be the country’s first in eight Olympic appearances. But to get there, Edwards and Canada will have to go through Melbourne and Australia in group play.

Edwards and Melbourne started talking trash about that game even before Melbourne was officially named to the roster. Edwards told Melbourne she planned to ask Canada head coach Víctor Lapeña to let her go one-on-one with Melbourne in that game on Aug. 1.

“We have a little inside thing of us two just being the youngest [on the Mystics],” Edwards said. “And even though we’re youngins, we still hold our own. … I told her that we’re not friends once that buzzer starts, but yeah, it’ll be fun seeing her in the [Olympic] Village and stuff.”

Like Edwards, Vanloo is ready to lead Belgium to new heights in her second Olympics. Three years ago, she averaged 12.9 minutes per game for the Cats, who lost in the quarterfinals to Japan by a point and finished seventh. But Vanloo’s career has turbocharged since then: She took her game to another level playing in France, became a starter for Belgium, and finally realized her WNBA dream this season as a 31-year-old rookie.

Belgium, too, has soared in the past few years, winning the 2023 EuroBasket title and nearly upsetting Team USA in February in front of a record home crowd.

“It brings some pressure from outside,” Vanloo told reporters on Tuesday about Belgium’s success. “People are saying, ‘Hey, you can go for a medal,’ this and that. But … we definitely want to do better than we did last Olympics.”

Vanloo’s performances in recent years made her a virtual lock to make the Cats’ roster, and she’s received near-daily check-ins from the national team this WNBA season. But it was still a thrilling moment when her second Olympic nod became official.

“It wasn’t a big surprise, but it’s always nice to see it,” she said. “When you see your face [on a graphic] and it says, ‘Olympian,’ it’s a very special feeling.”

Vanloo will team up with former Mystics great Emma Meesseman to try to deliver Belgium its first Olympic medal in women’s basketball. They’ll get another chance at Team USA in group play on Aug. 1.

And thrillingly for Vanloo, the group play games will take place in Villeneuve-d’Ascq, which is in northern France near the Belgian border. It’ll feel like a homecoming for her, she said, with many friends and family coming to support her after she’s played away from home for over a year straight.

As she put it in a short speech to her teammates as they celebrated her Olympic selection, it’s been “a summer full of dreams” for Vanloo, between the Olympics and her WNBA debut.

Melbourne, the youngest player in the WNBA, will play in her first Olympics in Paris after helping the Opals win their qualifying tournament in February. She got the news from Opals and New York Liberty head coach Sandy Brondello while the Mystics were on the West Coast in early July.

“I’d actually only just woken up,” Melbourne told The Next on Friday, “and then I was expecting just a phone call. Then it said, ‘Sandy Brondello, FaceTime call.’ I was like, oh, let me put my hair up [and] look appropriate.”

After Melbourne hung up with Brondello, she called her parents in Australia, who were “kind of on edge” waiting for the news and still awake at 2 a.m. local time. And later, she too got to celebrate with her teammates and circle the room for high-fives.

“I just couldn’t wipe the smile off my face, to be honest,” Melbourne said. “I’m always smiling, but I was just grinning from ear to ear. Being chosen to be an Olympian’s like a dream come true, something I’ve dreamt of for a long time. So to receive that phone call and get told you’re going to Paris, it was pretty special.”

In Paris, Melbourne will have a teammate who is twice her age, 43-year-old Lauren Jackson. The Opals won a medal in each of Jackson’s four previous Olympics and have their eyes set on the podium again. Melbourne hasn’t talked much with the staff yet about her role, but she expects it to be similar in some ways to her role with the Mystics, where she brings energy and pace off the bench.

“I don’t think it hurt her to play well against New York in front of Sandy,” Eric Thibault said on Tuesday, referencing Melbourne’s career-high 21 points against the Liberty on June 9. “… She brings something different to the table even than a lot of the Australian guards. So I’m happy for her. … I hope she gets a chance to really contribute on that stage.”

Melbourne has talked a little bit with some Opals veterans about the Olympic experience and with Edwards and Vanloo about what to expect in senior-level international play. But most of all, she’s eager to experience the Olympics herself and soak it all in.

“It just doesn’t feel real that I’m going to be at the Olympic Games. … You kind of talk about it, watching it on TV, and to actually be in and amongst it is going to be really cool,” Melbourne said. “So … I’m just going to make the most of every opportunity: the opening ceremony, the events in between, hanging out with my teammates, watching all the other sports, cheering and supporting Australians. I think I’m just looking forward to it all.”

During the Games, the Mystics players and staff at home will be cheering for their Olympians. Eric Thibault will have to root for family over his player when USA and Belgium clash, he said, despite his “soft spot” for the Belgians. But Richards told Vanloo she’d wear both teams’ colors if Australia and Belgium meet in the tournament. And Hines-Allen can keep practicing “O Canada.”

Neither Vanloo nor Melbourne was too concerned about whether Hines-Allen would learn their countries’ anthems as well. Vanloo pointed out that Belgium has multiple anthems, and Melbourne had a different request:

“As long as the [Mystics] girls know the chant — when I say ‘Aussie, Aussie, Aussie,’ and they reply, ‘Oi, oi, oi’ — I’m cool with that.”

The Next’s Cameron Ruby contributed reporting for this story.