American Otto speaks out on playing for Uganda’s Gazelles

American Jannon Otto returned to her club, Musel Pikes in Luxembourg, where she plies her trade as a professional basketball player in the wee hours of Tuesday, February 21.

Otto, is the most recently naturalized Ugandan, who played for the women’s national team, The Gazelles during the week-long (February 14 to 19) Fiba Zone Five Afrobasket Women’s qualifiers in Lugogo.

However, despite being in Africa for the first time, and only for one week, she left that sort of indelible mark that only defines top talent. Otto arrived in the country on Sunday, February 12. The reviews about her were not that big because little was known about her.

Yet, after seeing the kind of performance she put up for the Gazelles, fitting into the team seamlessly, created a wow feeling.

At the awards ceremony, following Egypt’s 74- 65 finals win over Uganda on Sunday, Otto was the only Ugandan player to make the list of the best five team of the tournament. The Gazelles assistant coach Mavita Ali said that was proof of how good Otto is.

“She gave the team all-round presence, both on defence and offence. But more importantly, she made the Gazelles a real attacking threat.” After Uganda nervously lost their opening fixture to the defending champions Kenya, 53-61, Otto led the fight back against Egypt in game two, scoring 27 points and picking 14 rebounds.

At 6ft tall, Otto has a lot in her repertoire. She can point the ball, dribble, pass exquisitely, shoot precisely and also defend solidly. She can play from position one to four comfortably. With such versatility, she is quite the asset to the Gazelles.

Uganda won that game 86-85. At the end of the qualifiers, Otto’s averages stood at 18.3 points per game. No wonder the Gazelles head coach Alberto Atuna always resisted substituting her. Otto’s average was 36 minutes of on-court presence, of the 40 minutes a game runs.

Although there are so many rave reviews towards Otto’s game statistics, Brenda Ekon, her teammate noted that she brought such a good vibe in camp.

“She is so kind and friendly. That made everyone love her,” Ekon said.

Against that, it is easy to understand why Otto was so sentimental as she said her good-bye.

“I was warmly received by everyone in this team, and they brought the best out of me. I cannot wait to join the group again,” Otto said. That will not be long, considering that Uganda was handed a wild-card to be at the Women’s Afrobasket in July.

For Otto, 25, the first white woman to play for Uganda, this is a dream come true. She joins an exclusive group of players with American heritage, who have been naturalized to represent Uganda (Silverbacks), including A’Darius Pegues, Jordin Mayes, Ishmael Wainright and Brandon Davies in recent years.

This business of naturalizing players, to represent Uganda, involves approaching them, and selling them the idea especially if they have little chance of playing for their countries of birth.

Once they buy into the idea, they sign a declaration committing to play for Uganda, a Ugandan passport is secured for them, and then they get clearance from their country of origin.

While Uganda can naturalize as many players as it wants, Fiba only allows it to use one in any tournament. In case the player wants to reverse the naturalization, they must pay $5,000 and sit out at least three years without international basketball. But considering how happy Otto has been here, Uganda is her team at heart.