Nykesha Sales

Nykesha Simone Sales (born May 10, 1976) is an American assistant coach at the University of Connecticut. She is a former professional basketball player in the WNBA, as well as playing in the Bosnian league for the ZKK Mladi Krajisnik club. Her primary position is the small forward. Her second position is shooting guard. In 1999, Sales was added to the roster of the USA FIBA Senior National Team. Her brother Brooks Sales played forward for Villanova from 1998 to 2002, and currently plays overseas in Spain for the Club Baloncesto Breogán of Lugo.

High school Sales attended Bloomfield High School in Bloomfield, Connecticut, and lettered in basketball. She was named the USA Today High School National Player of the Year in basketball, as a senior. Sales was named a High School All-American by the WBCA. She participated in the WBCA High School All-America Game in 1994, scoring 21 points.

USA Basketball Sales was named to the team representing the US at the 1994 William Jones Cup competition in Taipei, Taiwan. The USA team won all eight games, winning the gold medal, but not without close calls. In three games the teams had to come from behind to win. One preliminary game ended up as a single-point victory, and the gold medal game went to overtime before the USA team beat South Korea by a single point, 90–89. Sales averaged 2.5 points per game. UConn head coach Geno Auriemma felt bad that Sales did not already have the record, as he had made her sit on many occasions to avoid running up the score. The staged basket, while questioned in retrospect, was his attempt to make it up to her. He contacted the previous record holder, Kerry Bascom, as well as Big East Commissioner Mike Tranghese to ensure that the incident would not be a problem, although the media was, and to a degree continues to be, critical of the move. Sales's record would eventually be broken by Tina Charles.

Sales wore #24 in high school, the same number worn by Kerry Bascom at Connecticut. When Sales was considering going to Connecticut, she was respectful enough of Bascom's position, that she asked if she could wear #42, reversing the digits, rather than asking to wear #24.

Professional career

WNBA On September 15, 1998, Sales was selected as part of the league's initial player allocation by the Orlando Miracle. She remained with the franchise even when the Miracle relocated to Uncasville, Connecticut and was renamed the Connecticut Sun prior to the 2003 season. She helped lead the team to the WNBA Finals in 2004 and 2005. Sales was named to the WNBA All-Star team six times. Until she missed 12 games in the 2006 season, Sales had started 248 consecutive regular season games, the second longest such streak in WNBA history. However, she ultimately did not return to the WNBA.

International 2005-2006: Gambrinus Brno 2007: Lotos Gdynia 2007-2008: TEO Vilnius and SK Cēsis 2008-2009: SK Cēsis and ZVVZ USK Praha 2010-2013: Beşiktaş JK 2012-13: ZKK Mladi Krajisnik

Sports diplomacy Sales has also been an active participant in the SportsUnited Sports Envoy program for the U.S. Department of State. In this function, she has traveled to Cape Verde, Haiti, the Republic of Korea, Uganda, Ukraine, and Venezuela, where she worked with the likes of Becky Bonner, Christopher Clunie, Samuel Dalembert, Alex English, Willie Greens, Jason Maxiell and Tamika Raymond to conduct basketball clinics and events that directly or indirectly reached more than 2350 youth from underserved areas. In so doing, Sales helped contribute to SportsUnited's mission to reach out to youth populations in order to promote community leadership, education, women's inclusion and empowerment, inclusion of marginalized communities, and the inclusion of people with disabilities.

Career statistics

WNBA Regular season

Playoffs

College

Nykesha Sales Statistics at University of Connecticut Year GP FG FGA FG% 3FG 3FGA 3P% FT FTA FT% REB RPG

MIN PTS PPG 1994-95 35 159 294 0.541 35 81 0.432 45 77 0.584 162 4.6 73 11 102 753 398 11.4 1995-96 38 237 459 0.516 30 89 0.337 92 131 0.702 168 4.4 101 11 104 1028 596 15.7 1996-97 34 215 430 0.500 29 81 0.358 97 128 0.758 192 5.6 111 7 143 917 556 16.4 1997-98 30 241 426 0.566 40 105 0.381 106 135 0.785 166 5.5 86 11 98 813 628 20.9 Totals 137 852 1609 0.530 134 356 0.376 340 471 0.722 688 5.0 371 40 447 3511 2178 15.9