Te-Hina Paopao (born August 21, 2002) is an American

college basketball In United States colleges, top-tier basketball is governed by collegiate athletic bodies including National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), the United States Collegiate Athleti ...

player for the South Carolina Gamecocks of the

Southeastern Conference The Southeastern Conference (SEC) is an American college athletic conference whose member institutions are located primarily in the South Central and Southeastern United States. Its fourteen members include the flagship public universities of ...

(SEC). She previously played for the Oregon Ducks.

High school career

Paopao played basketball for

La Jolla Country Day School La Jolla Country Day School (known informally as "Country Day" or "LJCDS") is an independent school in University City, a community of San Diego, California. The school contains a lower school (consisting of nursery through fourth grade), a mid ...

La Jolla, California La Jolla ( , ) is a hilly, seaside neighborhood within the city of San Diego, California, United States, occupying of curving coastline along the Pacific Ocean. The population reported in the 2010 census was 46,781. La Jolla is surrounded on ...

. As a 10 year old, Paopao was the starting point guard for a U16 team. At 14 years old,

Kelsey Plum Kelsey Christine Plum (born August 24, 1994) is an American professional basketball player for the Las Vegas Aces of the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA). She won a WNBA championship in 2022, when she earned her first All-WNBA Fir ...

said "She's just never scared. It's like a fearlessness but a confidence that she has... I think she could start in the Pac-12 right now... Honestly, I think she could be the best to come out of San Diego." Plum would often invite Paopao to train with her, stating "Even to this day, when I go back, that's the only kid I would let work out with me, because she can hang with the intensity... She pushes me because I'm like, 'I can't let a 12-year-old beat me in this shooting drill." However, she suffered a

torn ACL An anterior cruciate ligament injury occurs when the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) is either stretched, partially torn, or completely torn. The most common injury is a complete tear. Symptoms include pain, an audible cracking sound during inju ...

in each of her first two high-school seasons. As a senior, Paopao averaged 22.7 points, 8 rebounds, 4.3 assists and 3.3 steals per game. She led her team to a 32–1 record and the Southern California Open Division regional title, but the state championship game was canceled due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

. Paopao received McDonald's All-American honors and was named California

Gatorade Player of the Year The Gatorade Player of the Year awards are given annually to up and coming high school student-athletes in the United States. They are given for boys' baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine playe ...

and California Ms. Basketball. Rated a five-star

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, she committed to playing

for

Oregon Oregon () is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of it ...

over offers from California, Oregon State and UCLA, among other programs.

College career

Paopao entered her freshman season as Oregon's starting

point guard The point guard (PG), also called the one or the point, is one of the five Basketball positions, positions in a regulation basketball game. A point guard has perhaps the most specialized role of any position. Point guards are expected to run t ...

, replacing

Sabrina Ionescu Sabrina Elaine Ionescu (born December 6, 1997) is an American professional basketball player for the New York Liberty of the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA). She played college basketball for the Oregon Ducks. She is the NCAA all- ...

Kelly Graves Kelly Lee Graves (born January 14, 1963) is the current head women's basketball coach at the University of Oregon. Previously, Graves was the head women's basketball coach at St. Mary's from 1997 to 2000, as well as Gonzaga University from 2000 to ...

, head coach of Oregon, had high praise for Te-Hina, “I think Te-Hina is next in the line of those guards that we’ve had that can just fill up the stat sheet. She’s a good rebounder, an excellent passer, an elite-level shooter,” Graves said. “I’m not saying she’s another Sabrina, but she’s got the ability to impact the game in multiple ways like Sabrina did.” She had chosen Oregon over other programs because Oregon had not stopped recruiting her amidst the injuries she faced through high school. She was part of the top-recruiting class, being one of the five five-start recruits, dubbed the "Fab Five". As a freshman, she started all games played and averaged 10.2 points, 4.4 assists and 3.2 rebounds per game, missing her last five games with a foot injury. Paopao earned All-

Pac-12 The Pac-12 Conference is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference, that operates in the Western United States, participating in 24 sports at the NCAA Division I level. Its College football, football teams compete in the NCAA D ...

honors and All-Freshmen selection - being one of only two players in the league to earn both honors. She also led all NCAA freshmen with a 2.40 assist-to-turnover ratio while ranking fourth in the Pac-12 in assists per game. As a sophomore, Paopao was sidelined early in the season due to injury. She averaged 13.6 points, 4.2 rebounds and 3.4 assists per game, repeating as an All-Pac-12 selection. She repeated with All-

honors in her sophomore year. By sophomore year, all the other four five-star recruits from Paopao's recruiting class had transferred out of Oregon. However, Paopao confirmed her stance to stay with the Oregon program. Two years later in a podcast, she revealed that while her family had encouraged her to transfer as well, she chose to stay to be 'loyal' to the program who had stuck with her through her high school injuries. In her junior season, Paopao averaged 13.1 points, 4.2 rebounds 3.3 assists per game, earning All-

honorable mention. Te-hina had faced a 6 game shooting slump this season, she later talks about how it had affected her mental health. Despite the slump, her 3PT% stats still concluded at 44%. For her senior season, she transferred out of Oregon and was recruited by

Dawn Staley Dawn Michelle Staley (born May 4, 1970) is an American basketball Hall of Fame player and coach, who is currently the head coach for the South Carolina Gamecocks. Staley won three Olympic gold medals with Team USA as a player and later was head co ...

South Carolina )''Animis opibusque parati'' ( for, , Latin, Prepared in mind and resources, links=no) , anthem = " Carolina";" South Carolina On My Mind" , Former = Province of South Carolina , seat = Columbia , LargestCity = Charleston , LargestMetro = ...

for her 3-point shooting skills, leadership and experience. Staley has commented on the impact of Paopao on their team, “It makes a big difference for someone like Pao, who is always calm, cool, collected. You know what her capabilities are. You know that you've got to guard her. She doesn’t take bad shots, so it’s great to have that on the floor and great to get our starting five back together just playing as a cohesive unit.” At the end of the regular season, Paopao was the nation’s top percentage 3-point shooter, hitting a career-high 48.6 percent from beyond the arc, and is among the SEC’s top 10 with 3.8 assists per game. She leads the SEC and is 19th in the nation in player offensive rating (Her Hoop Stats). Her 11.5 points per game include 15 games shooting at least 50.0 percent from the field and 11 games of at least three 3-pointers. In six games against ranked opponents, she is the Gamecocks’ top scorer at 15.0 points per game on 48.7 percent 3-point shooting. On the season, her 11.5 points per game and the 8.8 points per game teammates score on her assists, means Paopao has had her hand on 23.2 percent of the Gamecocks’ total offense. Against ranked opponents, that number rises to 29.8 percent. Paopao was named as "Finalist" for the

Nancy Lieberman Award The Nancy Lieberman Award, named for Basketball Hall of Fame legend Nancy Lieberman, was given annually by the Rotary Club of Detroit in the Award's first 14 years to the nation's top collegiate point guard in women's Division I basketball. Sue Bi ...

, alongside

Georgia Amoore Georgia Lee Amoore (born 3 April 2001) is an Australian college basketball player for the Virginia Tech Hokies of the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC). Early life and career A native of Ballarat, Victoria, Amoore grew up playing several sports, ...

Caitlin Clark Caitlin Clark (born January 22, 2002) is an American college basketball player for the Iowa Hawkeyes of the Big Ten Conference. She plays the point guard position. At Dowling Catholic High School in West Des Moines, Iowa, Clark was named a M ...

, Hannah Hidalgo, and Jacy Sheldon. After Senior Day, Te-Hina declared that she will be returning for her fifth year of eligbility.

National team career

Paopao represented the United States at the

2021 FIBA Under-19 Women's Basketball World Cup The 2021 FIBA Under-19 Women's Basketball World Cup ( hu, 2021-es FIBA 19 év alatti kosárlabda-világbajnokság) was a tournament organised by FIBA for women's youth national teams aged 19 years old and below. The tournament was hosted in Debrec ...

in Hungary. She averaged 9.1 points, 4.6 assists and 3.9 rebounds per game, helping her team win the gold medal.

Career statistics

College

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, 19 , , 19 , , 28.4 , , 43.3 , , 46.2, , 80.0 , , 3.2 , , 4.4 , , 1.4 , , 0.3 , , 1.8 , , 10.2 , - , style="text-align:left;", 2021–22 , style="text-align:left;",

, 23 , , 22 , , 32.7 , , 38.7 , , 30.0, , 87.0 , , 4.0 , , 3.3 , , 1.1 , , 0.1 , , 2.0 , , 13.6 , - , style="text-align:left;",

2022–23 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen b ...

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, 35 , , 35 , , 32.5 , , 44.0 , , 42.4 , , 88.0, , 4.2 , , 3.3 , , 1.3 , , 0.3 , , 1.8 , , 13.1 , - , style="text-align:left;", 2023–24 , style="text-align:left;",

, 37 , , 37, , 27.4 , , 46.1, , 46.8 , , 84.8 , , 2.6 , , 3.7 , , 0.8 , , 0.2 , , 1.6 , , 11.0 , - class="sortbottom" , style="text-align:center;" colspan="2", Career , 114, , 113, , 30.2, , 43.1, , 40.8, , 86.3, , 3.5, , 3.6, , 1.1, , 0.2, , 1.8, , 12.0 , - class="sortbottom" , style="text-align:center;" colspan="14", Statistics retrieved from

Sports-Reference Sports Reference, LLC, is an American company which operates several sports-related websites, including Sports-Reference.com, Baseball-Reference.com for baseball, Basketball-Reference.com for basketball, Hockey-Reference.com for ice hockey, Pro- ...

Personal life

Paopao is of Samoan and

Tokelauan Tokelauan is a Polynesian language spoken in Tokelau and on Swains Island (or Olohega) in American Samoa. It is closely related to Tuvaluan and is related to Samoan and other Polynesian languages. Tokelauan has a co-official status with Englis ...

descent. Her uncle,

Joe Salave'a Joe Fagaofe Salave'a (; born March 23, 1975) is an American football coach and former defensive tackle who is currently the associate head coach, run game coordinator and defensive line coach at the University of Miami. He previously served as ...

, played in the

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ...

as a

defensive tackle A defensive tackle (DT) is a position in American football that will typically line up on the line of scrimmage, opposite one of the offensive guards, however he may also line up opposite one of the tackles. Defensive tackles are typically the la ...

before becoming a

college football College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States. Unlike most ...

coach. She is a cousin of

softball Softball is a game similar to baseball played with a larger ball on a smaller field. Softball is played competitively at club levels, the college level, and the professional level. The game was first created in 1887 in Chicago by George Hanc ...

player Megan Faraimo.

References

External links

Oregon Ducks bioSouth Carolina Gamecocks bio
{{DEFAULTSORT:Paopao, Te-Hina 2002 births Living people All-American college women's basketball players American sportspeople of Samoan descent American women's basketball players Point guards McDonald's High School All-Americans Oregon Ducks women's basketball players South Carolina Gamecocks women's basketball players Sportspeople from Oceanside, California