University of Delaware Athletics
Basaranlar's Journey from Turkey To Newark
11/16/2023 3:30:00 PM | Volleyball
Ezgi Basaranlar's Delaware career has seen her reach numerous milestones and awards - she ranks third all-time in program history in assists, ranks 15th among active Division I players in assists, and is a three-time CAA All-Conference selection. Her volleyball roots, however, began over 5,000 miles away in her hometown of Istanbul, Turkey, with goals of becoming a professional before shifting focus into a collegiate playing career.Â
"My high school was one of the best schools in my city, so my education was also as important as volleyball to me growing up," Basaranlar said. "When I came here, I wanted to get a good education and go to school because you never know what's going to happen. If I got injured, I just wanted to have a backup plan and not just have volleyball in my life."
Basaranlar began playing volleyball when she was seven years old, inspired by her father. She described that playing in Europe is for fun until around the age of 11, but after, you are trained to play professionally. When she decided she wanted to play collegiately, few people were able to help with the process, since, at the time, not many athletes in high school had ever come to play Division I. She said five of her friends decided they wanted to play in the United States and further their education.
"It's almost like we started a trend because other people saw it and thought that's a good opportunity," Basaranlar said. "So now I know some people are getting help to try to come here, but for me I did everything myself."
In order to get noticed, Basaranlar uploaded her own highlight videos and reached out to schools and estimated she would send 50 emails a day, not knowing how the process worked since nobody knew. She said it was also a risk for NCAA coaches because she would need to prove herself to them.
"It was kind of weird because I really didn't have any idea what I was doing and my parents don't speak English so it was just me," Basaranlar said. "Coaches back home didn't want me coming here because why would they want to lose a player, but there were some coaches that were kind of helping me but they also had no idea what the process looked like. But everything worked out."
Delaware was one of the schools that Basaranlar had talked to after Kimberly Lambert, at the time as an assistant coach, reached out to her.Â
"I guess she saw my video, and then we started talking for a long time," she said. "She came to Turkey for three days, flew to Istanbul to see me, and it was at a time she wasn't allowed to talk to me either so we couldn't even have an actual conversation. She flew back to Delaware and they offered me."
Basaranlar describes herself as a high-energy person, but with English not being part of her daily life in Turkey, she had to adjust to not being comfortable talking all the time. She said her teammates were "super welcoming" and they formed a great bond in her first year. The culture shock was not as impactful for her, though, as many of her teachers were international in high school and she was raised with a global mindset. How big America was and television shows in the U.S. did not seem crazy to her. Being away from home was a struggle though, especially with the time difference.Â
"Not being able to communicate with my friends and family was just weird because I had to leave everyone behind and I had no family here," Basaranlar said. "But the people here, everyone was so nice to me. Delaware is a small state and where I'm from is one of the world's biggest cities so that was a shock. I was like 'what am i going to do here there's nothing to do' but at the end of the day it was nice. It created this safe environment for me, like me and my own little circle."
Starting right away during her freshman year until now was an expectation for her because of the level she played at growing up. She was not aware freshmen do not always get the chance to play right away, but realized it was a big deal.Â
"When people were saying to me 'oh my gosh you're starting' I was like 'yeah so what,'" She said. "It was just the standard I held myself to and the standard I'm used to growing up."
Helping build and develop the team culture is something that has stood out to her during her career. As an older team, she said since they've been playing together for so long, the team has developed into good friends off the court too. She credits Lambert as well for creating an environment where everyone enjoys each other.Â
"She was the reason why I came here," she said. "I just had this relationship with her where I really trusted her. Her becoming head coach, I think it was really significant to the team's success and finally getting to the championship last year, I think even that shows. It's easy to just talk about stuff but actually to be able to see the results, us being in the championship after not being there in my time before, that just showed a lot. We're all focused on volleyball and we have that one common goal, which is hard to have everyone on the same page and give 100 percent everyday and I think we're doing a good job of doing that now."
Currently in her final year of eligibility and in her fifth season as a Blue Hen, Basaranlar has helped Delaware to a 22-4 regular season record and 15-3 CAA record. Delaware has their most wins in a season since winning 26 in 2010, and have won 13 consecutive matches, one shy of tying a program record. She also became the fourth player in program history to reach 3,000 career assists, and earned her third consecutive CAA All-Conference honor. Delaware will play their first game of the CAA Conference Tournament on Friday at 6:30 p.m. at the No. 2 seed.Â
Her goal of playing professionally has remained the same from when she was younger, and she plans to return home after graduation. Traveling, living in different countries, and using volleyball as a way to see new places is something she said she would love to do, but her experiences at Delaware has her rethinking her options.Â
"Who knows," she said. "Maybe I'll stay here. I can't say I'm not thinking about it"Â
