From Camden to Paris: Sawyer keeps watch on Team USA's health

Quinton Sawyer will tell you that growing up in Camden County, he never dreamed he’d be the athletic trainer for an NBA team, much less accompany the USA Basketball Men’s National Team to an Olympic Games.

But Sawyer, who graduated from Camden County High School in 2000, has now done both. The athletic trainer for the NBA’s Charlotte Hornets, Sawyer is in Paris for the next five to six weeks, helping some of the greatest athletes in the world — LeBron James, Joel Embiid, Stephan Curry and Washington, N.C., native Bam Adebayo, among them — prepare for the 2024 Olympic Games and what they hope will be a gold medal-winning performance.

“It’s a blessing,” Sawyer said in a phone interview from Paris on Thursday. “I’m not 100 percent sure how it happened.”

Sawyer grew up one of nine children in a Camden family that goes back three generations. After graduating in 2000, the former Bruin went on to earn degrees from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill and eventually a doctorate in exercise and fitness.

His career as an athletic trainer began at the collegiate level. That would lead to a four-year stint as an athletic trainer with the NBA’s Phoenix Suns before he was hired six seasons ago to be the head trainer for the Hornets.

Sawyer’s road to Paris started in 2021 when he received a call from Team USA, asking if he wanted to work with the 2024 USA Basketball Men’s Select Team. The team is a collection of young NBA players, international players, free agents and college players who help the U.S. Basketball Men’s Olympic Team prepare for the upcoming Olympic Games.

“It’s a program to ensure the continuity of the team consisting of young up-and-coming players,” he said.

Sawyer wasn’t necessarily looking to move up and help train the actual U.S. Olympics team that would compete in the Olympics — but that’s what happened.

“I didn’t know what the procedure was (to work with Team USA),” said Sawyer. “So, you go out and put your best foot forward. When I received the call to work with the national team I was elated and humbled.”

Now, after a series of exhibition games this summer in Las Vegas, Abu Dhabi, and London, Sawyer is with Team USA in Paris. He said the experience is probably a lot like what it was like to be with The Beatles 60 years ago. Everywhere the team goes they’re mobbed by fans.

American NBA players like James and Curry have fans all over the world. In Paris, Sawyer says, the players are swamped by French fans searching for autographs and photographs.

“They have fans all over the globe,” he said.

While the experience can be a little surreal, Sawyer said his focus remains on helping keep Team USA’s players healthy and safe while they perform on the court. His job as head athletic trainer, as he describes it, is to be the first line of healthcare for the team. Whenever a player suffers an injury or has a health concern, Sawyer works with a medical team to get him the care he needs.

For the Olympic Games, Team USA players have brought along their own NBA team trainers so Sawyer’s job is to coordinate care and fitness training with those professionals. Trainers, he says, are some of the first people you’ll see on the bench, even before the coaches.

Sawyer says the Olympics is a “different scenario” from the NBA. During the NBA season, he develops relationships with the individual players and becomes familiar with their needs. At the Olympics, because the players are bringing their own trainers, his job is to coordinate the best care possible for the team while keeping an eye on the ultimate goal: Olympic gold.

“I’m here to serve them for five to six weeks and facilitate plans,” he said. “And to make sure they have what they need.”

Sawyer sees being a part of the Olympic Games as a way to contribute to the unity he believes his country back home needs right now. People may feel divided by politics, economics or other factors, but the Olympics Games can bring them together, he said.

“I see our country like a family,” Sawyer said. “There is a lot going on, but we can stay unified through the Olympics.”

When Sawyer returns to North Carolina, he’ll start preparing for his seventh season with the Hornets. He says he has Camden County and his family to thank for it all. His time at Camden County High School, Sawyer said, prepared him for any success he’s been able to achieve in life.

“As a kid from Camden, I don’t think I ever dreamed I would be in a position like this,” he said.