Kim Young-hee, Olympic silver medalist basketball player, dies at 59
Kim Young-hee, star of the 1984 Olympic silver medal-winning women's basketball team, died on Tuesday due to complications related to gigantism. She was 59-years-old.
Kim, who won silver medals at two Asian Games and 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, was forced to step back from professional basketball in 1987 when she collapsed during training and was later diagnosed with gigantism. Kim suffered from complications caused by the chronic condition for the rest of her life.
Kim, who played as a center, started playing basketball when she was a sixth grader and was called up for national team duty for the first time in 1980 when she was still playing at Soongeui Girls’ High School in Dongjak District, southern Seoul.
She made her international debut at the 1980 FIBA Women’s Asia Cup in Hong Kong, where she was part of the gold-medal-winning team.
She then graduated high school and joined the business basketball team Hankook Cosmetics the following year.
Kim continued to perform well in the national team, winning silver medals at 1982 Delhi Asian Games, the 1984 Summer Olympics and the 1986 Seoul Asian Games. The health problems that began in 1987 forced her to drop out of professional basketball, missing out on the chance to compete on home territory at the 1988 Seoul Olympics.
Kim's life changed completely after she left the basketball court, as her medical problems worsened and she struggled to make ends meet with a lack of support for former athletes.
Kim appeared in a video uploaded on the "Update Olympics" (translation) You-tube channel in 2021 in which she revealed that she had been living off her 700,000 won ($570) pension and struggling to pay her expensive medical bills. After the video aired, she received financial support from Korean basketball legends Hur Jae and Seo Jang-hoon and the Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism.
A memorial ceremony for Kim was held ahead of a WKBL game between the Cheongju KB Stars and Bucheon Hana 1Q at Cheongju Gymnasium on Wednesday.
The players and coaching staff of both teams held a 15-second silence in honor of the number 15 Kim wore while playing for Hankook Cosmetics in the 1980s.
No memorial altar has been set up for Kim. Her funeral is at 8:30 a.m. on Saturday in Bucheon, Gyeonggi.
BY JIM BULLEY AND PAIK JI-HWAN [jim.bulley@joongang.co.kr]
with the Korea JoongAng Daily
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