“Joining the Aces will be very exciting for me. I’m just grateful that they are willing to work with me as I am diving head-first into a new era in my life,” were Tiffany Hayes’ words when the Las Vegas Aces signed WNBA’s 11-year veteran guard who announced her retirement in December last year, citing wear and tear. This has been the result of Hayes playing 11 straight seasons with no breaks in the W and overseas in the off-season. Simply put, two separate seasons per year. However, with the relentless efforts of the Aces coach Becky Hammon, Hayes is back in the game.

On the other hand, Hayes will be representing her country, Azerbaijan in the 3×3 women’s basketball competition at the Paris Olympics 2024. So, let’s take a walk through her highly decorated basketball career.

Tiffany Hayes going the distance

Born in September 1989, to Dorothy and Renard Hayes, the Central Florida native attended Winter Haven High School, combining her 4-year prep career with a record of 117-9 and two state championships (2004, 2007). Her junior season saw basketball opportunities outside high school. She led the AAU team Essence to the national championship.

Hayes attended the USA Basketball-sponsored Youth Development Festival, a biennial gathering at the U.S. Olympic Training Center, where elite high school sophomore and junior athletes competed in three teams from the US and a team from Brazil. It was this experience that cemented that confidence in Hayes as she led the team to gold winning a majority of 5 games.

Next season, she came up as one of the top 22 players out of 3000 athletes to compete in the 2008 Nike SPARQ Training ‘My Better’ Championship event, where she finished in second place.

Fortunately, Hayes caught UConn’s attention when assistant coach, Tonya Cardoza spotted her playing AAU ball. It was that moment that locked UConn towards its future trailblazing Husky. As a result, UConn reached out to Hayes and made an offer, to which Hayes committed to attend. But she had one condition laid out upfront.

Hayes wanted to be close to the UConn legend

She asked to don No.3, which previously belonged to UConn legend Diana Taurasi. Hayes’ shot to fame came after her teammate Caroline Doty took a hit and was sidelined. Just then Hayes was moved up to the starting line-up.

It was the start of something big as she kept scoring in double digits throughout the season. In 2011, Hayes played the 101st game of her college basketball career translated the game into her 100th win, and became the fastest player in NCAA’s history to reach this milestone. Leading UConn to two national championship titles and 4 Final Fours she concluded her 4-year career at a record 147-7.

The 14th overall draft pick was then selected by the Atlanta Dream, the team she spent a decade playing for. Within that decade, the All-Star garnered several recognitions under her name. And now that she is back, she has a good chance of adding a championship title to that list alongside the Aces in their run for a three-peat.

Stay tuned for more such updates, and to follow what Shaq’s ex-agent, Leonard Armato, has to say about the Reese-Clark rivalry and more, watch this video: