Meet Zaila Avant-garde, 2021 Scrabble champion and basketball world record holder

Zaila Avant-garde dreams of becoming a WNBA champion one day.

Now she will be content with the title of Scrabble.

On Thursday night, the 14-year-old from Louisiana won the 2021 Scripps Scrabble Championship. She won the victory by correctly spelling Murraya, which is defined as “a genus of tropical Asian and Australian trees” and is often referred to as orange jasmine or orange jasmine.

After finishing the game relatively easily, she was ecstatic. Together with Jody-Anne Maxwell, she became the only black winner in the bee’s 96-year history.

The avant-garde said that bees are not her top priority. Nevertheless, she took time to spell 13,000 words a day to prepare for the competition.

“For spelling, I usually try to do about 13,000 words, which usually takes about 7 hours,” Qianwei said In an interview with NOLA.com“Of course, we won’t let it go too far. I have school and basketball to do.”

Basketball is her focus.She holds three Guinness World Records, including One of most basketballs that dribble at the same time (six).

As you can see in this Instagram post, the avant-garde also has skills on the court.

She hopes these skills can take her place.

“Basketball, I’m not just playing it. I really want to take it somewhere. Basketball is what I do,” Qianwei said. “The photo shoot is my side job. It’s like a small snack. But basketball is like the main course.”