Gülşah Akkaya

Gülşah Akkaya — Biography

Gülşah Akkaya is a former women's basketball player who was a top scorer in the Turkish, Greek and Israeli leagues and won more than 200 caps for Turkey. She was in the national squads that won gold at the 2005 Mediterranean Games and silver at the 2011 European Championship. Today she serves on the board of the Turkish Basketball Federation and shares her views on women's basketball with the public.

She started playing at 13 at a sports school in Denizli and, after Deniz Nakliyat and Fenerbahçe, went to the United States in 1997. She played NCAA basketball at Lynn University for two years, and her 23.8-point average is still fourth on the school's single-season scoring list. Back home she played for Fenerbahçe; in 2002-03 she was the top scorer at the Greek club Panserraikos with 204 points and in Israel she helped YES Ramat HaSharon to a championship. She moved to Erdemirspor in 2003 and to Mersin B.B. in 2004, and in 2004-05 averaged 22.0 points to be the league's top scorer.

In later years she played for Beşiktaş, Mersin Büyükşehir Belediyespor, Galatasaray, El Cadi La Seu d'Urgell in Spain, Samsun and TED Ankara Kolejliler. After returning to Beşiktaş in January 2013 she averaged 12.4 points and 4.3 rebounds in the second half of the season, playing a leading part in keeping the team in the league, and she became team captain the next season.