Daleyza Castellanos of Sylmar is a cheerful 10 year old with a great sense of humor who enjoys playing with her two sisters. She also has a competitive spirit and natural prowess for math – she surpassed more than 200,000 kids nationwide to become one of 24 finalists from the U.S., Puerto Rico and Australia who will compete in the 2024 NBA Math Hoops Global Championship.
“I really love math; it’s my favorite subject,” said Daleyza, who will be a fifth grader at Sylmar Elementary School this fall. “I’ve always been one of the top students in math in my classes. I am humbled and honored because I was selected out of so many participants for the finals.”
Launched in 2015, Math Hoops offers in-person and digital gameplay that encourages students to combine their math expertise and knowledge about basketball – a.k.a. “hoops” – to “draft” NBA and WNBA players to create teams and solve math problems using real-life game and player statistics to score points. Daleyza rose to the top during the 2023-2024 Math Hoops season to advance to the upcoming championship playoffs, being held June 25-28 in New York City.
“Daleyza is one of the smartest and most thoughtful students I have ever worked with,” wrote Priscilla Galvez, site coordinator at Sylmar Elementary for LA’s Best, which facilitates NBA Math Hoops and other afterschool programs, in her letter nominating Daleyza for the finals.
“She helped so many students learn the game and was very patient with the students who were still learning. Many of our students look to her for motivation and inspiration,” continued Galvez. “[Daleyza] is a student that tries her hardest in everything she sets her mind on.”
Including quickly learning about the fundamentals of basketball. Although Daleyza enjoyed playing soccer and other sports, she wasn’t a basketball fan until she joined Math Hoops for the first time in the past year, noting that she decided to participate “because it was math related.”
“I was not a basketball fan when I first started, but … thanks to Math Hoops I was able to attend my first Lakers basketball game,” said Daleyza. “Then I started to find basketball interesting.
“I am now a Lakers fan,” she added. Not only that, Daleyza beat 250 students in the Math Hoops regional competition and will represent the LA Lakers region at the upcoming championship.
“I am representing the Lakers, but I am also representing LA, my school Sylmar Elementary and all my San Fernando Valley people,” she said.
Lia Peralta, senior marketing manager at Learn Fresh, a nonprofit that partners with the NBA on Math Hoops, said the program is about more than basketball; it promotes both “STEM skills and social-emotional learning.” Math Hoops gameplay builds fundamental math skills, encourages sportsmanship and helps kids become more proficient at sharing responsibilities.
For Daleyza and her mother Daisy Vianey, traveling to the East Coast for the competition – which is being subsidized by Learn Fresh for finalists and their family members – will be the first time the mother and daughter get to visit New York City.
“I feel very proud of my daughter,” said Vianey. “This is a very big achievement. She has always been very competitive – ever since kindergarten. I know she will do great in this championship.”
“I feel very excited,” added Daleyza. “I am ready to bring the championship back to Los Angeles and make my community proud.”