A lot of Australians have failed to forgive Liz Cambage after she withdrew from the Opals Olympic campaign, a week out from Tokyo.
The squad's leading pointer scorer in Rio 2016 cited her deteriorating mental health for her omission — now, the star centre says she is feeling better than ever.
The four-time WNBA All Star said she had "zero" interest in representing the green and gold in the upcoming Women's World Cup in Sydney, before signing with the LA Sparks for the 2022 WNBA season.
"My heart lies with those who want to protect me and those who want me to be the best I can be, and I never felt that at the Opals at all, so yeah I'm good," Cambage said.
"Welcome to Liz Angeles" was the greeting from American fans like Mary Macey Parco, who made hand-painted signs for Cambage's first preseason match with the Sparks in Northridge California, a little over two weeks out from their first game of the upcoming WNBA season.
Cambage is hard to ignore as she takes to the court, towering over both her teammates and competitors at 203cm.
American journalist Edwin Garcia, who writes for WNBA publication 'Swish Appeal', said Cambage is the dominant force the franchise needed after failing to make the playoffs and losing 20 games in 2021.
"She's definitely a very opinionated and strong force, she's big and loud and proud about it, so there's always going to be some drama and intrigue with Liz," Garcia said.
The preseason match wasn't the show-stopping performance Cambage has offered in the past, scoring just four points in the Sparks' 87-84 point victory after she was reduced to just 11 minutes of action after being fouled out in the third period.
Post match, Cambage told the ABC she was hard done by.
"I don't know what he [the referee] was doing off season but he needs to get it together before we get back into the league that was ridiculous."
LA Sparks head coach Derek Fisher said he knew what he was signing up for when he took on Cambage.
"We also have to make sure that we're protecting Liz and her ability to play basketball as well."
Cambage has a rich history in the WNBA with her 53-point game record from 2018 with the Dallas Flyers still intact.
The 30-year-old was the WNBA number 2 draft pick at just 19 and had been contracted to the Las Vegas Aces for the past three seasons.
Cambage said she wants to clock up big point games for the Sparks.
"I didn't have that green light in Vegas and I don't know, some people must have forgot what my scoring record looked like," she said.
