(AP Photo)
UNCASVILLE, Conn. (AP) — Connecticut Sun forward Jonquel Jones is raising money for her native Bahamas after the destruction from Hurricane Dorian.
Jones has set up a page on the crowdfunding site GoFundMe , hoping to raise $50,000 for the archipelago. She donated $10,000 and the page had just under $20,000 in donations early Thursday.
In a video posted to the page, the player said her family is OK and “in a good situation.”
“We’re just hoping and praying that everyone continues to be safe,” Jones said. “Right now the only thing we can do is be proactive and try to give so that when the storm does pass, people have a way to get over it and get back to their daily lives.”
Jones said she and the other organizers of the page are deciding which relief organizations will receive the funds.
She moved from the Bahamas at 14 to pursue basketball in the United States. Jones recently wrote about her experiences in the Bahamas for The Players Tribune , including having the roof of her home peeled back by Hurricane Wilma in 2005 and finding fish swimming in her living room.
“The thing I’ll never forget is trying to dry off our family photo albums, wiping away the water from the Kodak prints,” she wrote. “And for a minute, it worked — and you could see all these memories again. And then the image would slowly fade to black. We lost years of our history as a family, and that’s why I work so hard to really remember things how they were, because that’s all we got now.”
Jones is averaging more than 14 points and nearly 10 rebounds for the Sun (22-9), who clinched a WNBA playoff spot. They host the Dallas Wings on Wednesday night.
Jones is not the only Bahamian athlete raising money. The Sacramento Kings’ Buddy Hield, who played youth basketball with Jones, also set up a separate GoFundme page . He planned to donate $100,000 toward relief efforts.
