Come What May, Evina Westbrook is Embracing Her Unique Basketball Journey

Westbrook had been primed to exceed expectations in her second Athletes Unlimited Pro Basketball season in February 2024. She certainly made a splash in her AU debut in 2023, and this time, she’d set the bar even higher for herself. But one fateful moment in a preseason scrimmage eliminated any chance to prove herself worthy of another WNBA opportunity. 

With a steep road to recovery ahead, the injured guard went to her fellow AU Pro Basketball athletes for advice and resolved to go back to where her passion for the game first took flight. She leaned back on her community in Salem, Oregon, where she spent her formidable years competing as the only girl on an all-boys AAU basketball team. 

From grades 4 through 8, the squad from “The Hoop” stuck together, traveling up and down the West Coast, and developing a bond that remains intact to this day. During those years, Westbrook earned the loyalty of her teammates and demanded respect from her opponents. 

Encouraging conversations with those childhood teammates strengthened her resolve. 

As Westbrook, motivated by an invitation to the 2025 AU Pro Basketball season, worked through her rehabilitation process in 2024, she rekindled her youthful love of the game by stepping in as a coach for her father’s AAU Program, Run & Shoot. She calls that one of the best decisions she made during her break from the action. 

“Just being with them twice a week for practice, and then on the weekends too … I remember literally being that little and what my coach was telling me, so it brought a lot of that memory back,” Westbrook said. “I was able to give that back to them, so that was probably one of the best things that I did all offseason.”

Rejuvenated by those Salem reconnections and experiences, the 26-year-old completed her recovery and has returned to the court for AU Pro Basketball Season 4, resuming her WNBA pursuit. 

She knows what it will take to recapture her place in the highly competitive league. It’s a stage she spent her entire collegiate career preparing for. 

Westbrook first committed to the University of Tennessee, where she made an immediate impact – starting in 64 matchups and averaging 11.5 points per game in her first two seasons – but in 2019 she was once again faced with a tough decision. In the wake of a coaching change for the Volunteers, Westbrook transferred to the University of Connecticut. 

“I always pictured myself being at a school for four years, you know, being loyal and just staying with that group,” Westbrook said. “Everything happens for a reason, and I made the decision to leave, which actually ended up being one of the best decisions that I made.”

Following an initial redshirt year at UConn, Westbrook played in all 66 games for the Huskies over her redshirt junior and senior campaigns and helped lead her team to an NCAA finals appearance in 2022.

After her collegiate career, the opportunities got bigger, but one of the few decisions she still had the power to make was to simply show up and make the most of every opportunity.

In the Spring of 2022, Westbrook was drafted 21st overall by the Seattle Storm but was waived following the team’s training camp. Thus began the rocky journey through the pro basketball space. 

Westbrook’s first two years in the WNBA included stops with the Minnesota Lynx, Washington Mystics, Phoenix Mercury, and Los Angeles Sparks. 

The UConn grad experienced her fair share of growing pains as she adjusted to a new level of play, as well as the unpredictable nature of the industry. 

“If I could have stayed with my first team that I got drafted to, and if I got to choose that, I would, you know?” Westbrook said. “But you go through the business side of things, of how stuff really works, and you just have to get on the right team at the right time. It doesn’t mean you’re not good enough.”

Despite the setbacks that marked her first two years as a pro, Westbrook’s determination never wavered, and it was the experiences she shared with fellow AU Pro Basketball athletes that supplied further encouragement to embrace her unique journey. 

That journey began for Westbrook – the fierce competitor on an all-boys team – even before she could have envisioned its final destination; while she first developed the grit that has served her so well on and off the hardwood. 

“I always had to play with a chip on my shoulder going to AAU tournaments and being the only girl,” she said. “So I think that’s definitely where it comes from, and I’ve always just tried to carry that with me.”

The months spent getting back to her roots in Salem proved successful in putting her back in position, both mentally and physically, to return for the 2025 AU Pro Basketball season in Nashville, Tennessee, where she showcased her leadership skills as a Week One captain. Her return to the community environment she shares with her AU teammates is just as significant as her return to the court. 

“One through 40 is top-tier talent,” Westbrook said of the pool of players in Nashville. “…But everyone goes through similar things. So when you come to a place like this, and you’re talking to older [players], younger, it’s like, damn, we’ve had the same experiences … So it’s super cool to talk to people like that. You don’t feel alone at all.”

After two weeks of play, there is a growing list of AU Pro Basketball athletes who have secured WNBA contracts and training camp opportunities. Westbrook hopes to join that list, but regardless, is ready to embrace whatever comes next on the winding path her pro career has taken her down thus far. 

If anything, overcoming each obstacle has only deepened her love for the game.

“Since I started playing with the boys in fourth grade, I haven’t stopped loving basketball,” she said. “There have been days where I didn’t like it, you know, but I don’t think I’ve ever stopped loving the game … If you really love to do something, then you do it to your best ability.”

Many athletes might have succumbed to frustration and discouragement, rather than continue a pursuit like Westbrook’s. But she remains unshaken.

“There’s now 13 [WNBA] teams, and it’s definitely growing, but to keep your mentality in the same spot is probably the biggest thing because it’s going to happen,” she said. “I know it’s going to happen for me, just at the right time, in the right place, because everyone’s journey is different. I just always keep that in the back of my mind.”

Siera Jones is the digital media reporter at Athletes Unlimited. You can follow her on Instagram and X @sieraajones.