SPORTS
December 5, 2016
THE ASIAN REPORTER n Page 13
Asians in American sports w Asian Americans in world sports
Seattle’s Tokashiki blazes Japanese WNBA trail
SIZE, SPEED & STRENGTH. Ramu Tokashiki
of Japan has completed her second season with the
Seattle Storm of the Women’s National Basketball As-
sociation, where she helped the team rise from a dis-
appointing 2015 performance to a playoff berth in
2016. (AP Photo/Elaine Thompson)
By Mike Street
Special to The Asian Reporter
he Women’s National Basketball
Association (WNBA) has drawn
from players across the globe, but
few of those have come from Asian
countries. A notable exception to that
trend, Japan’s Ramu Tokashiki, has
completed her second season with the
Seattle Storm, where she helped the team
rise from a disappointing 2015 perfor-
mance to a playoff berth in 2016. Although
the Storm was eliminated in the first
round, the team is looking forward to more
success with Tokashiki in the years to
come.
Tokashiki came to basketball relatively
late, at age 12. But seven years later, she
was a standout rookie for the JX-Eneos
Sunflowers of the Women’s Japan
Basketball League (WJBL). In her first
season with the Sunflowers, she led her
team to the championship, earning Rookie
of the Year and Most Valuable Player
(MVP) honors. At more than six feet tall,
Tokashiki towered over other WJBL
players, slamming dunks with both hands
and using her impressive reach to
dominate the paint.
Over the next six seasons, Tokashiki
became a WJBL force, as the Sunflowers
won five straight championships and she
was honored with two MVP awards. She
further distinguished herself as a two-time
MVP with Japan at the FIBA (Inter-
national Basketball Federation) Asia
championships.
Seeking a greater challenge, Tokashiki
signed a one-year deal with Seattle before
the 2015 season, becoming just the third
Japan-born player to play in the WNBA.
The first two, Mikiko Hagiwara and Yuko
Oga, did not make much of an impression,
each averaging less than three points per
game.
But Tokashiki is a different player than
Oga and Hagiwara, both of whom were
guards. Tokashiki’s nickname is “Taku,”
T
Japanese slang for “strength,” and it’s a
fitting one. At 6’3” and 176 pounds, she has
the size and strength to play the low post
and the speed to blaze down the court on
fast breaks.
Her size makes her fairly average in the
WNBA. But Seattle teammate and all-star
Sue Bird raved about Tokashiki’s “crazy
athleticism” and her great jumping ability,
calling her “probably one of the fastest post
players I’ve ever seen.”
Despite these natural talents, Tokashiki
took some time to adjust to the WNBA’s
more physical play. In 2015, Taku started
the season’s opening game but struggled
and found herself on the bench. She kept
her head high, focusing on her defense,
speed, and hustle. One opponent
remarked, “She kind of plays with a little
chip on her shoulder … she was running
the floor every single time … that shows a
lot about her.”
After scoring 21 points off the bench in
June 2015, Taku found herself back in
Seattle’s starting lineup. In the middle of
the season, however, she left Seattle to
play with the Japanese National Team,
leading the squad to a gold medal for the
second straight year at the FIBA Asia
Women’s Championship, which qualified
them for the 2016 Olympics.
After her return, Tokashiki played so
well down the stretch that she barely
missed making the all-star team.
Nonetheless, she was named to the
all-rookie squad after a season in which
she averaged 8.2 points per game, 3.3
rebounds, and 0.9 blocks. This production
also put her in fourth place in the Rookie of
the Year voting, with teammate Jewell
Loyd taking the top honor.
Such an impressive rookie season put
huge
expectations
on
Tokashiki’s
shoulders heading into 2016, which began
with a multi-year deal in Seattle. Her
coach, Jenny Boucek, said, “Taku is a key
building block for our future. Her
combination of passion, athleticism,
fearlessness, and instinct for the game
makes her a dynamic playmaker on both
ends of the floor.”
Taku responded to those expectations by
becoming a consummate team player.
With the first pick in the 2016 draft,
Seattle chose forward Breanna Stewart,
who’d led the Connecticut Huskies to four
straight National Collegiate Athletic
Association championships, and won four
straight Final Four Most Outstanding
Player awards.
This shifted Tokashiki to the bench for
the first half of the season, where she
provided excellent support until the
WNBA season broke for the Rio Olympics.
In Rio, Team Japan finished in eighth
place, thanks to Taku’s 17.0 points-
per-game average, third best overall.
Rejuvenated, Taku saw her role grow
again with the Storm, and she averaged
seven points and four rebounds per game
down the stretch to lead Seattle to the
playoffs. They fell to the Atlanta Dream,
85-94 in the first round, but the Storm
have plenty to look forward to in 2017, as
Taku continues to develop with the team’s
core of Bird, Stewart, and Loyd.
In the offseason, Tokashiki has returned
to the Sunflowers in the WJBL to keep her
skills sharp and challenge her stamina.
Her role is different in Japan, where she
dominates the middle instead of playing on
the outside as she does in the WNBA. As
she passes her way out of double- and
triple-teams and grinds the ball inside,
Taku is further developing the all-around
game that will benefit Seattle in the
future.
As she becomes even more of a force,
Taku will continue to blaze a trail for other
Asian players looking to make their mark
in the WNBA. And she will give Asian-
American sports fans someone to watch in
2017 — and beyond.
Talking Story: Alberto and Kolini and the Lion of Africa
Continued from page 6
world.
New Americans from all over
— from the chaos of Arabia and
Afghanistan; from the corrupt
republics of the former Soviet
Union; from the ethnocides of
Southeast Asia, East and Central
Africa; from the grinding violence
of Mexico, Central and South
America; from the sinking
islands of our Caribbean and
Pacific — love this democracy
stuff. Like Kolini loves rugby.
While I’m leaning on Jimmy’s
ugly car’s hip, he’s urging deeply
wounded Rwandan grandpas and
moms and kids out from behind
apartment doors locked tight
against Portland’s grimmest
neighborhoods. Engage govern-
ment, he says. Here, the
governed must tell leaders how to
govern us. Now, democracy is the
antidote to bitterness. Trust me,
he says.
And not only Jimmy Dogo says
so. The president of the United
States of America, says it too.
That Hawai‘i-born, Java-raised,
Harvard-schooled, son of Kenya
and Middle America, assured
undocumented students brought
here as babies, he assured
parents without felonies, that it’s
safe to come out from behind
those doors. Engage government,
Mr. Obama said. Do that, and
legal papers and work permits
will be on the table.
America’s president is a bit
humbled, tonight. River City’s
biggest believers are stalled on
chilly curbsides and slouched in
emptied classrooms. Jimmy and
me are watching rain run up and
down his windshield. We’re all
suddenly no longer sure. Not of
our nation. Not of ourselves.
Paralyzed.
This paralysis, insh’allaah,
must be temporary. And partial.
It must only be between you and
me, inside this exhausted mo-
ment. Inside this doubt. Families
with rent and utility bills due
tomorrow, must never see us like
this. Dreamy teens used to seeing
their moms and uncles earnestly
engaging government, must not
be betrayed. Not by America. Not
after all that awfulness that sent
us here.
The bottom line, and the end of
this essay, is more about Ore-
gon’s policy and business leaders’
next moves than it is about our
brown and black and blue
guapos. Our community mechan-
icos’ commitment, their compas-
sion, is clear. Their persistence
(stubbornness) is legend.
Also clear is where our Ameri-
ca’s impending mood swing will
send our institutions’ enormous
momentum.
Will our institution’s leaders
reciprocate with loyalty and love?
These guys need government to
tell them, to their tired faces, that
they and those they care for, will
be cared for. Like familia in good
times and bad. Like A+ Alberto
and his faithful BMW. Like
Special K and his tough and
tender aunties.
w
The Asian Reporter’s
Expanding American Lexicon
aunties (Old World and New
American): Term of affection and
respect for women in the speaker’s
community of nurture. With this form
of address, comes an expectation of
familial reciprocity — an exchange of
duties traditionally expected between
elders and youngers.
BMW (German): Bayerische
Motoren Werke. Since 1917, a
Bavarian company making aircraft,
motorcycles, and cars much loved by
elegant engineers and simple
motorheads everywhere.
carabao (Pan-Asian): Stubborn,
reliable, working animal tenderly
cared for by their families.
Dwayne
Douglas
Johnson
(Samoan): “Maui” in Disney film
Moana. “The Rock” in World
Wrestling Federation (WWF) rings.
Pro footballer and wrestler, movie
producer and actor.
honky-tonk (American): As used
here, a style of county western music,
typically narrating a love gone very
wrong, and about bad behavior follow-
ing. Similar bluesy stories run through
“country” music of all continents and
most islands in between.
Jah tentu (Indo patois): Yes,
certainly.
familia (Spanish, Indo, and Filipino
patois): Family. As used here refers to
wider crew feeling and behaving in
traditional interdependent ways.
Every gender, every generation, every
kind of schooling does different things
well — share those things for a bigger
and better familia.
kretek (Malayu and Indonesia
bahasa): A tobacco and clove cigarillo.
Smokes nice, tastes like heaven.
krotjong (Indo patois): A regular
guy. Kind of “country.” Also a popular
music genre. See: honky-tonk.
tidak (Malayu and Indonesia
bahasa): Nope.
Tongan: A Kingdom of Tonga
citizen or, as used here, a River City
resident. Tonga is a constitutional
monarchy of about 102,000 people
living there, of about 23,000 living in
California, and about 1,000 in Oregon.
The Kingdom’s 169 Pacific islands are
about 3,200 miles southwest of
Hawai‘i, and about 2,300 miles east of
Australia.
Singa Afrika (Malayu and
Indonesia bahasa): Lion of Africa.
In traditional cultures, great cats of
the
genus
panthera,
possess
enormous spiritual gravity as well as
physical power. As used here, a dutiful
elder with those attributes, working
one of Portland’s 70 or so ethnic
streams.
Give blood.
To schedule a blood donation call 1-800-G IVE-LIFE
or visit HelpSaveALife.org.