SAN JUAN (Puerto Rico) - The Dominican Republic U17 Women's National Team took another step forward in favor of women's basketball of that country after winning the Bronze medal of the Centrobasket U17 Women’s Championship, held this week at the Coliseo Roberto Clemente of San Juan.

The youth team is one of the national development projects that the Caribbean country has been working on from the base in the past years. With the triumph, the Dominican Republic earned a ticket to the FIBA U18 Women’s Americas Championship 2020.

The Dominicans celebrated victories against Costa Rica and Barbados in the group stage and then beat Guatemala for the bronze medal. Their two setbacks, one against Mexico and another against Puerto Rico, both finalists of the tournament.

"This is the effort of a good job we have been doing," Ariel Portuondo, coach of the U17 Women’s National Team. "It is an extremely young team that has been growing little by little during the competition and I am content with the players, they have made a very remarkable effort".

Regarding the philosophy of the current Dominican basketball program, the Cuban coach mentioned that it is a change of philosophy focused on working from the earliest ages upwards, to create continuity to the efforts.

"We are making a change. We wanted to change the image of basketball and we have gone to the youth categories to strengthen what is going to give us a working pyramid and continuity. It is one of the ideas we are developing, and we already see the result. This is an extremely young team, so we understand that they have done well so far."

Although pleased with the performance during the tournament, coach Portuondo mentioned that it is only the beginning, for a group of players that aspires to much more.

"I think so [we have a good level] but I think we have more. We must give a little more support to these players who have great effort and dedication," said Portuondo.

For the coach, the continuity given to the program will be the key to achieving more achievements.

"We must give continuity to the work," said Portuondo. "We have to maintain the project we have, and I hope that in the future we will have stability in this work, and we will have better results. We are dreaming big and we have it, we have the material. I've been a bit strong with the girls, but they've understood me, and they know why. Today they see the result of all the work we have done."

FIBA