Cayla's Story
Fast Facts
Sport: Basketball
Event: Women's
Olympic History: Rio 2016, Tokyo 2020
Year Born: 1989
Born: Adelaide Hills, SA
About Cayla
Cayla George grew up around Adelaide Hills, South Australia. Whilst living there she attended Mt Barker High and Cabra College. Cayla started off playing netball, however once she made the switch to basketball she didn’t look back. She began playing for the Eastern Mavericks and continued to love the game as well as the overall physicality it brought.
After conversations with Kentucky and Miami US Colleges, George decided to pursue her professional career at home in Australia’s WNBL, she was 16 years of age when she started playing with the Australian Institute of Sport. From here George’s career took off. 2007 saw her win ‘Rookie of the Year’ as she averaged a double-double per game, 15 points and 11 rebounds.
Cayla has since played for many teams in many accomplished leagues. In the WNBL she’s gone on to play for Adelaide Lightning, Logan Thunder, Townsville Fire and the Melbourne Boomers. In France she’s played for both Pay d'Aix Basket and Nantes Rezé Basket, she also had a stint playing for Sopron in Hungary. In the WNBA over in the US she has represented both the Phoenix Mercury and the Dallas Wings.
Cayla’s exciting career thus far has made for many monumental highlights - such as being a part of the Opals for the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio. In nine minutes per game she averaged 4.6 points and 2.2 rebounds throughout the Rio tournament.
Cayla was part of the silver-medal winning Opals 2018 World Cup side – their best finish since winning the gold in 2006. She's also won three WNBL championships.
At the delayed Tokyo 2020 Olympics - in 2021 - the Opals played Belgium (L 85-70), China (L 76-74) and Puerto Rico (W 96-69) in the group phase. In the quarter-finals they squared off against the USA, losing to the eventual Olympic champions 79-55 and finishing 8th in the tournament.
Cayla played in all four matches, averaging 13 points, 7.3 rebounds, 3.3 assists and 1.3 steals in 26.8 minutes per game.