The alera is part of the preselection of Gregorio Martínez for the AmeriCup to be played in Puerto Rico. Established as a benchmark thanks to her experience, she reviews her career in this interview.
The sense of opportunity is sometimes decisive in life. Without knowing it, without even thinking about it, one day fate may surprise us. The story of Natacha Pérez, who is part of the Argentine preselection as one of its most experienced players, began from a coincidence that quickly unleashed a passion that she had never contemplated before. A few days before the Women’s National Team embarks on its trip to Puerto Rico to compete in the AmeriCup 2021 that will be held from June 11 to 16, Pérez spoke with Prensa CAB to review its history and current affairs within the sport.
A chance that turned into passion
“I actually always wanted to play soccer. I grew up with my sister and my three male cousins; it was all ball, River shirt and nothing else. It was a coincidence, one day I fell into a summer colony with a cousin, I had just started in a little school in a little field two blocks from my house to rally. But hey, when I went to this neighborhood with my cousin right at that club, the one who was a teacher was a coach. I ran fast I remember, it was the only thing I did, he said to me ‘do you want to come and start here?’ and that’s where I started by chance in Pacifico “, Nacha remembers about her first contacts with orange. It also ensures: “When I started it was a game for me, I was going to have fun. Yes we compete obviously, but my coach Guillermo Sentorri, who we called him Pocha, was super educational and entertaining, I was really going to play and have fun, I didn’t mean that I was in a competitive sport ”.
“At about 13 or 14 I was summoned for the first time to the Mendoza preselection, I didn’t even know that it existed, imagine the level of the hanging and the little notion, I didn’t even know that there was an Argentine basketball team. There I started a little more, as it was a wake-up call. I competed in the national team, I had the chance to be in the team, but I think that when I started it further was when I decided to leave Mendoza at the age of 17 and I had the opportunity to come to Lanús, that’s when I said ‘well, I want something more ‘. I had finished my year of junior U19 with the World Cup in Thailand, I was 18 and I said ‘if I stay in Mendoza it will be very difficult for me to continue competing’, I was older. I had the possibility to come to test 6 months, my parents really supported me from the first moment, they told me ‘go ahead, if you want and feel like it, we will bank you’. I would not have done or experienced anything of everything that came after without them, they have always been my support and they continue to be to this day ”.
The first step, hand in hand with the study
From playing and having fun he went on to discover a huge sports world and even to excel in it. He won a bronze medal at the 2009 U19 World Cup in Thailand, a moment that he remembers with great emotion: “In addition to the game, that team had a mystique and a connection that I did not see or feel elsewhere, that litter surpassed everything. It was very exciting that we all felt part of it. I can not not bring smiles or good memories of that tournament “. And after that performance, a great milestone in the history of our basketball, his personal growth began.
“I came to compete here, I saw how he trained in Lanús, the friction, the competition, the teams, I loved it. Unfortunately in Mendoza we don’t have that kind of competition. I went back and told my dad ‘I want to go back’, I don’t want to be here, and well, I never went back there. I think that there was like a hinge decision for me, to start directing my life with basketball “, Nacha remembers about the decision to come to Capital, a before and after in his career.
“That half a year that I came I had started studying in Mendoza, then when he came to Buenos Aires I followed him a little at a distance until the third or fourth year of the degree because it was very difficult for me to finish finals, the virtual modality was not there. I traveled to Mendoza to finish, I traveled and returned, it was chaos for me. I began to accumulate several finals and I said I was changing to a university from here, that’s when I went to the UAI”, Says the woman from Mendoza about her first steps in an extensive journey that combined a sports career in national basketball with study. But this effort is no accident: “I always had my head in studying, it was the advice of my parents since always. In fact, my dad studied when he was grown up, he was received at the age of forty with us accompanying him. They never pressured me to say ‘no, you have to study, you don’t go’, it was always advice and obviously they taught me that it was a tool for me to decide how I wanted, it was always my decision”.
In the next 10 years, while he was studying, he played for Lanús, Las Heras Básquet and Deportivo Berazategui. She was champion of multiple tournaments with the maroon team, including Federal Women, and was crowned champion and MVP of the National Women’s League in the 2019 Apertura tournament, wearing the ‘Depo’ jersey.
The first experience abroad
Nacha received her Bachelor of Nutrition at the beginning of 2020 and it was the door to take the great leap, the one she had always hoped for: “I always had the possibility of going to play abroad, obviously because of the roles and because since the market began to open with the players, the truth is that there is the possibility of going, in different categories, it does not matter, but there is the chance to go. to try that experience outside. I always wanted to do it, I always had it in mind, but I knew that if I left at any time in my life it would be very difficult for me to take up the study again, it was a great effort that we were doing together with my parents, so I said okay I put a lot of will on him with everything, but hey, I always prioritized the National Team. Luckily I was able to receive myself in the middle of the pandemic “.
In January of last year, at 28 years old, his participation in Serie A2 in Italy was confirmed, where the Alera looked forward to wearing the ASD Feba Civitanova jersey, but it could not be given that the COVID19 pandemic complicated their plans and the forced a step back: “It was difficult to come back from Italy in the middle of the pandemic, with the world in chaos, with Italy being the focus after China, from there I started like ‘uff right now that I’m leaving, all this happens'”.
Finally in mid-2020 the European markets reopened and Nacha was one of the many players who had a contract to play in the old continent. From August to May of this year he was part of CB Almería, in the Spanish Women’s League 2. During the season he played a total of 24 games in which he averaged 7.4 points, 5.1 rebounds and 1.4 assists in 28 minutes per game.
“The Spanish federation with the protocols, the directives to follow, a lot of responsibility on the part of all and a lot of compliance. We had all the time during training a place to sit back, disinfect, the protocol of the time we were there after training: they could not spend 10 minutes. All very strict. They swabbed us every Friday before playing, in case there was a positive case they isolated us all. The truth is that he is also a role model because they did everything perfect, the tournament could be played without problem, when a team played that stopped due to some contagion after the matches were rescheduled, they organized it very well in such a way that the tournament ended when they had said it was going to end “ Pérez comments on this first atypical but positive experience.
In addition, her experience in Spain left her in awe: “The league, how they organize the tournaments, the championships, the competition that there is hopefully, I dream that Argentina can be a model, a copy of what competition and women’s basketball are in Spain, it would be like a dream, how they are organized , the professionalism that there is, everything, obviously it must have been many years of work and to achieve that structure but hey it would be a dream to be able to see that here in Argentina “.
While on his personal experience he assures: “I felt very good, the truth is that I always saw the girls, I have friends who have played there for a long time, I have followed many games and I always had the intrigue of whether I could play, if I was at the level. But the truth is that it was all excellent, I felt very good in the game, with my coach Alex Gomez, I think I can say one of the best coaches I have had in my life because I learned a lot and he helped me a lot, he also gave me a place on the team that didn’t feel like pressure. Obviously, having been with Maqui Durso for me was very important not only in sports, but also emotionally. But as a general balance, the truth is that I felt very good, I was surprised by myself because I said well, I could do it and perhaps I was not going with high expectations but as good to see ”.
The emotion of continuing to wear the blue and white
“Every time I wear this shirt I remember when I was super little and I had no idea that this existed, and like that now that I am older, that one starts to think about all those things that he left on the road or which was like giving it another priority. For me, always representing the national team and being here was my priority and as I was telling you, postpone study, I moved away from my family for looking for my best version and obviously for looking for a place in the team. A lot of things go through my head, but I do not regret anything that I chose in my life and how I wanted to walk, but hey, it’s like you wear this and for me it means a lot of effort, not just mine, of my family and a lot of happiness, a lot of pride obviously “Natacha expresses excited from her room at the Ramada Hotel when asked what it means for her to participate in a preselection again.
“I think that we all have as our little part of being referents, that is, of all this time of having been in the national team, we are all referents from different points. Some from the game, others from the attitudinal, others from the effort, I think that having held this place for so long means something for the little ones and well, each one took their reference from the place where they feel identified. But I think that each one did something to be able to be here and keep it, which is the most difficult thing, that makes you a benchmark player, ”says the Mendoza woman who wore the national team’s jersey more than 10 years ago. But, despite being one of the most experienced and having been part of several processes with the largest, the alera experiences this concentration in a very particular way: “We are like with a lot of uncertainty because we do not know when the team will be released, I swear to you that I am living it as if I were 15 years old because it was always for me to be until the last moment, yes, no. The truth is that I am always available to the team in whatever I can give, I am 100%, always available to whatever is needed on or off the pitch ”.
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