Sports Envoy

Chineze Nwagbo started her basketball career at Duval Senior High School in Lanham, Maryland. Her honors include two back-to-back state championship titles, “All-American Honorable Mention,” “All-County First Team,” “All-Gazette,” “USA Today’s Most Improved and Most Important Player to Scout” in Maryland, among others.

Chineze was also a standout basketball player at Syracuse University, where she earned her Bachelor of Science degree in biology. After graduating, she played basketball professionally for 11 years in Spain, Chile, Brazil, Poland, Portugal, and Israel, winning four MVP titles. The highlight of her career was representing her parent’s native country of Nigeria in the 2006 World Championship Games.

After retiring in 2016, Chineze began a series of ventures with the NBA. In China, she helped develop grassroots implementation of an NBA-based basketball curriculum. She has done work for Junior NBA programs, the NBA’s Basketball Without Borders developmental camps, and worked with the Atlanta Hawks, New York Knicks, Washington Wizards, and the National Basketball Players Association as a youth development coach and mentor.

Chineze has also served as an envoy for the U.S. State Department Sports Diplomacy Program, which was designed to use sports as a platform to create social change in communities around the world. As an envoy, Chineze has traveled to various parts of the world, building relations with U.S. embassies, sports federations, sultans, chargé d’ affaires, administrators, coaches, and players. She has also dedicated her time as a motivational speaker to various youth programs and nonprofit organizations working with underrepresented, and underserved youth around the world.