Ann Meyers

Born Ann Elizabeth Meyers on March 26, 1955, in San Diego, she was the middle child in an athletic brood of eleven siblings. Their father, Robert Eugene (Bob) Meyers, played for the Milwaukee Shooting Stars with the American Basketball Association, following a varsity career at Marquette University. Meyers's mother, Patricia Anne (Burke) was a homemaker.

In fifth and sixth grade Meyers played basketball on an all-boys team after her parents argued for the inherent right of their daughter to play with the boys in the absence of an all-girls team. By freshman year at Sonora High School in La Habra, California, she was an impressive player and earned the Most Valuable Player (MVP) award from her school. She repeated the season MVP honor at a new school, Connelly High in Anaheim, as a sophomore and was named an All-Star. In addition to her competition in the El Dorado and Loara High School tournaments that year, she participated in the St. Anthony's high school tournament and earned the tournament MVP honor. In the eleventh grade she won season MVP honors for a third time, having returned to her former Sonora High that year. In addition to lettering in basketball, Meyers graduated from Sonora in 1974 with letters in field hockey, softball, tennis, track and field, volleyball—even badminton—for a total participation in seven sports. She was named an All-American for each of her four years of high school and played with the Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) from 1970-74. As a senior in 1974 she was named the School Athlete of the Year and became the first high school student ever named to the U.S. national team.