When Puerto Rico’s women’s basketball team plays its opening-round game in the Olympics in Paris on Sunday, Rich Brown will be in front of the TV.

That’s because former Bellport High School basketball star Arella Guirantes will be playing guard for Puerto Rico.

Brown, the assistant boys varsity basketball coach at Bellport, is a longtime mentor and family friend.

“She’s like a little sister to me,” Brown said of Guirantes, who scored more than 2,200 points for Bellport and went on to star at Texas Tech and Rutgers and play in the WNBA.

“It’s a very big thing for her and she’s very, very excited,” said Brown, who spoke with Guirantes recently. “We all wish we could be in Paris to support her.”

Guirantes’s basketball skills were evident early on, Brown said.

By fifth grade, she was running circles around the boys. She joined the girls varsity team at Bellport as a seventh-grader and could score even when opposing teams double- and triple-teamed her.

“At 10 years old, we knew she was going to be who she is,” Brown said. “She was destined to greatness.”

Guirantes, 5 feet 11 inches, is a “three-level scorer,” Brown said, meaning she can score from near the basket and sink shots from mid-range and long distance.

Guirantes proved that at Bellport, where she made the all-New York State team as a senior and was the No. 44th-ranked player in the nation.

In her three seasons at Rutgers, Guirantes averaged 17.4 points per game and was first team All-Big Ten and an AP All-America honorable selection her junior year.

The Los Angeles Sparks selected her in the second round of the 2021 WNBA draft, and she also played for the Seattle Storm.

Guirantes played for Puerto Rico’s national team at the FIBA Women’s AmeriCup tournament in 2023, where she led Puerto Rico to a fourth-place finish and led all scorers in the tournament.

Puerto Rico’s women’s team is making its second appearance in the Olympics. The team has three games scheduled: Sunday against Serbia; Wednesday, July 31 against Spain; and Saturday, Aug. 3 against China. The team can make it to the medal round if it keeps winning.