Hall of Fame

Crucial to the development of women’s basketball in the United States, Lisa Leslie became the second women’s basketball player to be inducted into the USOPC Hall of Fame. As an All-American at USC, she led the Trojans to four NCAA tournaments, advancing to the Elite Eight in 1992, and was named the 1994 National Player of the Year. After college, she became a member of the historic 1995-96 U.S. team that tallied a 52-0 record in preparation for the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta. The team’s 1996 gold medal was the first in a string of four straight Olympic titles for Leslie. After setting a U.S. Olympic record 156 points in Atlanta, she led her team to another gold medal and a perfect 8-0 record at the Sydney 2000 Games. In 2004, she became Team USA’s all-time leading scorer, rebounder and shot blocker with 407 points, 185 rebounds and 25 blocked shots through three Olympic appearances. As the oldest member of the 2008 U.S. Olympic Women’s Basketball Team at age 36, she remained a double-digit scorer in Team USA’s gold-medal performance in Beijing. At the time of her induction into the USOPC Hall of Fame, she owned 10 U.S. Olympic women’s basketball records. Just one of five U.S. women to have played in four or more Olympic basketball tournaments, she posted double-digit scoring averages in every major international event in which she competed. Additionally, she helped launch the WNBA in 1997 as one of the league’s first premier players. She is a three-time WNBA MVP, two-time WNBA champion and eight-time WNBA All-Star. During the 2001 WNBA season, she became the first person to win the league MVP, all-star game MVP and championship MVP honors. She was also the first player to dunk in a WNBA game. She retired in 2009 as the WNBA’s all-time leader in points and rebounds, and was inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in 2015.