Brianna Jones’ basketball odyssey began on a blacktop in New York as a little kid. Today, the one-time nursing home volunteer’s play has taken her all around the world, most recently as a part of the Puerto Rico women’s basketball team at the 2024 Paris Olympics.
“She started playing at a very early age around the second grade or the third grade,” said Christina Jones, Brianna’s mother. “It really started out of a need to keep her busy on the weekends. I’m a nurse and I had to work weekends, so my husband had to figure out what to do with her. He was playing pick-up basketball on the weekends with his friends and family members and he would bring her along. Afterwards, they would put the ball in the hoop and practice shooting.”
Unlike Jones, Halle Hazzard’s track and field career took a little bit of time to develop after focusing on gymnastics until middle school when an injury changed her focus. But that didn’t stop her from sprinting to the Olympics, representing Grenada in the 100-meter dash in Paris.
“Her [athletic] journey started at the age of four years old,” said Pauline Hazzard, Halle’s mother.
Jones and Hazzard may have taken different paths to get to Paris but both routes ran through Gurwin Jewish Nursing & Rehabilitation Center in Commack, NY, where each volunteered as children — and where their mothers have worked for 16 and 32 years, respectively. Christina Jones is a registered nurse and the director of nursing while Pauline Hazzard is a certified nursing aide and a program assistant.
As volunteers, both athletes spent lots of time around Gurwin as children. Brianna helped out in the recreation department as a high schooler while Halle has worked with Alzheimer’s and dementia patients since she was a small child.
Cheering from near and afar
As their daughters’ athletic careers flourished, the families learned to make tradeoffs.
“The sacrifice is so real,” said Pauline, “There’s no vacation. You pick up your mail in the mailbox and you read it in the car. Breakfast is in the park, lunch was in the car, changing of clothes in the car. My daughter was very dedicated to her sport. She loved it.”
Today, it is safe to say those sacrifices paid off handsomely. After high school, Halle ran track and field at the University of Virginia and received her master’s degree at the University of Southern California in journalism, documentary and film. Meanwhile, Brianna ended up playing basketball for the University of Louisville before transferring to Georgetown University where she graduated with a bachelor’s degree in accounting and a master’s in sports industry management.
While the mothers got to be in Paris to cheer their daughters on, there were family contingents cheering for Brianna and Halle all over the world. Christina notes that her father in Puerto Rico, Brianna’s grandfather, would even wear her Puerto Rico national team jersey when he would venture into town.
While the Puerto Rican basketball team did not medal, Jones was a crucial part of the team’s starting five, averaging 5 points and about 18 minutes of action per game.
Hazzard made the finals in her event, placing 8th in the 100-meter dash with a time of 11.70 seconds.
Excitement in the halls
Family members were not the only ones who tuned in to the excitement in France. Pauline’s social adult day program participants turned Halle’s events into watch parties. They even veered into fashion design to show their support.
“They cut out all my daughter’s clippings from the newspaper and they posted them on my file cabinet,” Pauline recounted. “They made Olympic T-shirts [photo above] and then they sent me pictures of them making the T-shirts and watching my daughter running in the Olympics.”
The 2024 Olympics might be over but the memories made by the Jones and Hazzard families in Paris will last forever. Now, it is time for Brianna and Halle to move on to their next bucket list items, and their next career moves. While Brianna will go back to Puerto Rico before returning to her professional basketball career in China, Halle will return stateside to see her family and do some summer reading in Gurwin’s dementia program.
“We’re very proud of them,” said Christina. “They both started here as volunteers and to see two athletes from one area and then from one workplace is amazing.”
