Making Team USA a tall order for former BYU two-sport star

Of all the female athletes I have interviewed over the years, the one I look up to most is Jennifer Hamson.

She stands 6 feet 7 inches tall.

Jen Hamson is in Las Vegas this week, trying out for the U.S. women’s national basketball team during a minicamp at the Mendenhall Center on the UNLV campus.

She was the tallest one on the court Monday — Brittney Griner, the WNBA star who is 6-8, decided at the last minute not to participate.

Griner was arrested April 22 on suspicion of assault after a fight with her fiancee, a fellow WNBA player named Glory Johnson. Had Griner shown up to reject minicamp shots, there might have been a media circus afterward.

My take on Geno Auriemma, Team USA coach and also coach of a certain women’s basketball team called Connecticut, is that he is not terribly fond of a media circus, unless he was responsible for creating it.

So Hamson was the tallest one there, for those scoring in the bleachers after Geno said it was OK to come in.

She also was one of only three nonroster invitees, to use a spring training baseball term, who were trying out for the team, or at least the pool of players from which next year’s Olympic team will be selected.

So one could look up to her for that reason, too.

Or because she also was a fantastic two-sport athlete at Brigham Young after spurning offers from UNLV and other suitors.

Lamson grew up in Lindon, Utah. Her mother, Tresa Spaulding Hamson, is widely recognized as the best women’s basketball player in BYU history.

The Lady Rebels never had a chance.

There was a time when Jen Lamson thought she might even become a three-sport star.

She was good at gymnastics, too, but then she had her growth spurt, and then she was at this one gym meet where it was decided that if she nailed her dismount from the balance beam, she would hit the ceiling.

Judges tend to mark you down a couple of tenths when you hit the ceiling.

So Hamson decided she would be only a basketball player and a volleyball player. And now that her BYU career is over — she was a two-time All-American in volleyball and West Coast Conference Player of the Year and Defensive Player of the Year in basketball, making it to the Sweet 16 in both sports and to the NCAA title match in volleyball — she’s only hooping it up now.

She soon will begin her WNBA career with the Los Angeles Sparks. She also wants to play overseas during the winter and, should everything fall into place, for Team USA — if not in Rio at next year’s Olympics, then maybe in Tokyo in 2020.

She was given jersey No. 39 with the national team, which is sort of like a baseball player being given a number in the 70s during spring training. But some of Team USA’s stars are getting older, and who knows if Brittney Griner and her betrothed can patch up their differences?

Eventually, a transfusion of new blood will be called for.

Those who stand 6-7 and swat shots — Hamson finished her BYU career second in career rejections behind only her mother, who also is 6-7 — usually are the first to get asked about their blood type.

When I asked when was the last time her mom had blocked her shot, Hamson said it has never happened — unlike Jake and Jesus Shuttlesworth in the movies, they have never played one-on-one.

She didn’t block any Team USA shots during minicamp on Monday morning, either, because it’s not right to disrespect one’s elders. That said, Hamson said she was trying hard to send shots back to the Thomas & Mack Center parking lot and make an impression on Geno and the other coaches.

It’s just that if you haven’t noticed, the women who play for Team USA are pretty darn good — these proud Americans have won five consecutive Olympic gold medals, and four of the past five golds at the FIBA World Championships.

They may not dunk, but they run the plays as they were designed. They usually listen to Geno and the other coaches. And when you try to block their shots, the American women are good at adjusting, or passing to somebody who has a better shot.

“I’m really excited to be here and be a part of this and having an experience like this. It’s fun,” Jen Hamson said at the beginning of our chat.

At the end of it, I still was looking up to her. Even after she removed her sneakers. I asked if there ever was a time when she wished she were only 6-2.

She laughed and said no. Like Villanova coach Jay Wright in those Old Spice commercials, this is a young woman who is comfortable in her own skin.

Alas, I persisted.

“Not even on prom night?”

“No,” Jen Hamson said, swatting my follow-up query into the T&M parking lot.

“Only when I’m trying to buy jeans.”

Las Vegas Review-Journal sports columnist Ron Kantowski can be reached at rkantowski@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0352. Follow him on Twitter: @ronkantowski.