The Senior Women's National Team is coming off a great start to the summer having won the Gold Medal at the Pan Am Games in Toronto. The next step for them is to qualify for the 2016 Olympics Games in Rio de Janeiro by winning the FIBA Americas Tournament taking place in Edmonton. Leading up to the Americas Tournament we spoke to our SWNT members and they gave us their thoughts on a few things and here's what they had to say. To buy tickets for the 2015 FIBA Americas Championship for Women, click here.

Kim Gaucher

I can vividly remembers pointers that Diane Norman, Nikki Johnson and Teresa Kleinschmidt were giving me as I was coming up and I was playing with them. They were the people that really took me aside and showed me the ropes and really made a huge impact on me and my career. And having that chance to do it now is really fulfilling and rewarding.

I’ve always dreamt about having a long national team career. Playing for Canada was always my dream and goal. I never grew up wanting to be a WNBA player; I wanted to be an Olympian. It’s what I’ve dreamt of as a kid. To have a long career I was hoping I would get the chance to be able to mentor when I was older.

The biggest thing this summer is to stay grounded. After the Pan Am Games, we celebrated the result. But we had to keep in mind that this isn’t the big one. Staff at the Games asked us if we wanted to cut down the nets and I said, “No. We want to cut down the nets in Edmonton.” Our summer’s not done yet. Winning gold was a crazy high but it wasn’t an Olympic berth. I don’t want to say it was unfulfilling - I enjoyed every single minute of it - but I only took one day off and the following day I was in the gym shooting. I knew we weren't finished yet.

Part of my leadership is showing what it takes to be a player at this level. I’m a hard worker; I spend a lot of time on my game, I put up a lot of shots, I still come to the gym early and shoot and doing all the little things to take care of my body and I’m just trying lead by example.  

‍