The third time was the charm, and Carlota García Azqueta and Cecilia Fanjul Franco, Oviedo basketball players from the Ecole, finally had their experience outside of Asturias. The pandemic had prevented them from playing with the Asturian team in the Spanish Junior Championship, first, and the sixth wave left them in January without the junior, but they had a great time in the Women’s Mini Cup, played in Valencia in parallel to the Cup of the Queen.
Carlota García Azqueta, a 13-year-old point guard, and Cecilia Fanjul Franco, a pivot who has already turned 14, were part of Bembibre in the Valencian capital. The competition is reserved for the children’s teams of the Endesa Women’s League, but the Bierzo team lacks a quarry, so it formed a selection with players from the land and neighboring provinces, and selected the two Asturians.
The illusion of the players to participate in the Mini Cup has not come for free. They were summoned to three training sessions with the team, for which they had to travel once to León and twice to Bembibre. But once at work, in the impressive facilities of L’Alquería, everything went smoothly. Both were starters for a team that finished fourth, after defeating Avenida and selling their skin dearly in the semifinal and in the match for bronze.
“Carlota is pure passion for basketball, and whatever comes into her head, she goes for it. She is cheerful and outgoing, a good student, and she brings a lot of joy to the house. And she is a warrior, sometimes the faces she makes on the court scare me”, says Patricia Azqueta, the mother of Carlota, a student of the Ursulines who started basketball at the Asturian Center, playing with boys. Despite being so young, she altruistically trains 5 and 6-year-olds at the Asturian Center. “The more connected she is with basketball, the more focused she is academically,” emphasizes her mother.
Cecilia, who has already turned 14, is 1.75 meters tall and is a student at Auseva. The school team fell apart with the pandemic and she wanted to continue playing, so she was clear about it when the opportunity to go to the Ecole arose. “She likes basketball a lot and Valencia was the best for her, with such brutal facilities and being able to watch a major league game. The pity is that they couldn’t see her final because they had to go back, ”says her mother, Guadalupe Franco. Cecilia is not the only basketball player in her house: she also plays her twin Juan, who accompanied her sister to the Valencian adventure.
Miguel González, basketball coordinator at the Ecole, a center with a long tradition in this sport, did not miss the event either: “I was excited to see the girls in the Mini Cup, and they did very well”. Now yes, in a few days, the Children’s National awaits them.
