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Katie Smith

Basketball

Served as envoy

  • 2011  –  India

Katie Smith was born on June 4, 1974, in Logan, Ohio. She began playing basketball in the fifth grade. Smith attended The Ohio State University from 1992-1996, where she excelled on the basketball court. As a freshman, she led the Buckeyes to the NCAA championship game and was named Sports Illustrated and Big Ten Freshman of the Year, and Kodak All-American first team. She finished her Ohio State career as the leading scorer in Big Ten women’s basketball history and was the first woman to have her basketball jersey number retired at Ohio State.
In her first season of professional basketball Smith led the Columbus Quest to the American Basketball League (ABL) title. Smith repeated as ABL champion with the Quest in 1998, the league’s last season. Smith joined the Minnesota Lynx of the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) for the 1999 season. The six-time WNBA All-Star lead the league in scoring in 2001 and became the first American Professional Woman to score 4,000 points. She was traded to the Detroit Shock in 2005 and earned two WNBA titles with the team in 2006 and 2008, earning Finals MVP honors in 2008. She is a two-time All-WNBA first team member (2001, 2003), two-time All-WNBA second team member (2000, 2002) and was named to the WNBA All-Decade team in 2006. In 2010, Smith signed a free agent contract with the Washington Mystics.
Smith has also achieved basketball success in international competition. She is a three-time Olympic gold medalist for USA (2000, 2004 and 2008) and two-time World Champion (1998 and 2002). She was named USA Basketball Female Athlete of the Year in 2008.
Throughout her career Smith has been an active member of the community as she served as spokesperson for the United Way Race Relations Department in Ohio, was an Olympic torchbearer in Columbus, Ohio, for the 2002 Salt Lake Games, and was honored by the Columbus Touchdown Club as the Ohio State Female Athlete of the Century.