Vanderbilt's Mikayla Blakes Lands a Spot on USA's Americup Roster
Vanderbilt women’s basketball team has such a bright future you need sunglasses to look at it. A big reason for that is superstar freshman Mikayla Blakes.
Blakes, who was named the USBWA Tamika Catchings National Freshman of the Year and SEC Freshman of the Year, was selected to the USA Basketball 2025 FIBA Women’s AmeriCup Team that will compete in Santiago, Chile from June 28-July 6.
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Blakes is one of 12 players selected for the roster that will compete in Americup Tournament. The winner of the tournament will earn a berth to the 2026 FIBA Women’s World Cup scheduled for next summer in Berlin, Germany.
The USA team will bring to Chile a player that rewrote the SEC and NCAA record books. In addition to freshman of the year awards, Blakes was named an All-American by seven different organizations. Her 55-point performance at Auburn on Feb. 16 set the NCAA freshman single-game and SEC single-game scoring records. She previously set the SEC single-game and NCAA true freshman scoring records on Jan. 30 with a 53-point effort at Florida. Blakes also set the Vanderbilt single-game scoring record on three separate occasions this season.
The 2025 USA Women’s AmeriCup Team will open Group B play with host nation Chile, followed by Colombia, Puerto Rico and Mexico. Here’s the full, 12-player roster for USA:
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Raegan Beers Mikayla Blakes Madison Booker Audi Crooks Joyce Edwards Hannah Hidalgo Flau’jae Johnson Gianna Kneepkens Olivia Miles Kennedy Smith Hannah Stuelke Grace VanSlooten
Since the event’s inception in 1993, the United States has captured four AmeriCup gold medals, including titles in 2019 and 2021. For more information about the 2025 FIBA Women’s AmeriCup, click here.
Hopefully, Blakes can put the USA team back on top.
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-8b6c726067ba8eb0b5197041f28d1b64.jpeg "Taylor Hodges")
Taylor Hodges is a staff writer for Vanderbilt Commodores On SI covering all-things Vanderbilt. Taylor brings more than a decade’s worth of award-winning sports writing, photography and video experience covering every level of sports — from Little League baseball to professional sports and other sports like hunting and fishing. Taylor is fueled by his lifelong passion for sports that began the same day Kirk Gibson hit his legendary World Series walk-off home run, Arkansas beat Texas in Austin and No. 4 Notre Dame beat No. 1 Miami in the Catholics vs. Convicts game.