Is this Sacramento basketball star headed to the 2024 Olympics? He just made the Mexican team
A former Sacramento high school star has secured his spot on Mexico men’s basketball team and will now try to help the team punch its ticket to the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris.
Iseal Silva, a 2020 Jesuit High School graduate, officially joined the 12-man roster this weekend after spending the last two weeks training in several cities across Mexico. Silva was regarded as one of the top high school basketball players in the nation during his time at Jesuit. He has since played two seasons at Stanford University and one year at Long Beach State. Silva has recently joined the college basketball transfer portal, a digital tool that helps student athletes move between institutions.
“It’s an honor to be able to represent a country, especially a country that’s in your blood and that you have so much pride in,” Silva said.
The 21-year-old Mexican-American now hopes to play in the Olympics later this summer.
Mexico competes in a 2024 Olympics qualifying tournament this week in Puerto Rico. If the team wins the tournament, it will head off to Paris and participate in its first Olympics since 1976.
“We have a chance to do something special,” Silva said.
While Silva was born in Sacramento, he has strong ties to his family’s hometowns in the Mexican states of Michoacán and Jalisco. Both of his grandparents immigrated from Mexico and spent years working in the fields of Salinas Valley to provide for the family.
“All my family is super excited,” Silva said. “My grandparents are brought to tears, super emotional.”
Silva also hopes to build on the hardworking and accomplished legacy of his Mexican family.
Silva’s grandfather, Rafael Silva, had his oral history archived at Stanford’s Bracero Legacy Project and his father, Francisco Silva, was named as one of The Sacramento Bee’s inaugural Latino Changemakers in 2022.
The Mexican team will face off against Lithuania at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday and Ivory Coast on 2:30 p.m. Thursday.
