Elena Delle Donne, the current WNBA MVP and one of the world’s biggest basketball stars, has revealed she is gay.
The Chicago Sky player, who is leading the US women’s quest for gold in Rio, told Vogue magazine that she is engaged to her longtime partner Amanda Clifton, and confirmed the news to reporters in Brazil.
The interview, which appeared in Vogue’s August edition, said: “Elena divides her time between traveling with her team, the Chicago Sky, and her family’s home in the rolling green landscape of Wilmington, Delaware. She and her fiancee, Amanda Clifton, keep apartments in both Chicago and Wilmington.”
Delle Donne acknowledged the article in during a talk with reporters on Wednesday.
“It was just one of those articles where they came into my home, spent a couple days with me, and [fiancee] Amanda [Clifton] is a huge part of my life,” Delle Donne said. “So to leave her out wouldn’t have made any sense. It’s not a coming out article or anything. I’ve been with her for a very long time now, and people who are close to me know that, and that’s that.”
The article said Delle Donne and Clifton were engaged on 2 June.
“As the future keeps moving on, I don’t plan on having our relationship out in the public and all this media on it,” Delle Donne told reporters, “but obviously there’s excitement right now because people see it for the first time.”
“I decided I’m not at all going to hide anything,” she added.
The US women’s basketball team, who are gunning for a sixth straight gold medal, begin their campaign against Senegal on Sunday.
Della Donne said her Sky team-mates have known about her relationship with Clifton for a while. “They know Amanda,” Delle Donne said. “She’s always around. It’s nothing crazy.”
