Kye Allums spent much of his youth searching for his identity. Now, he will soon take that identity onto an NCAA basketball court for George Washington’s season opener, and in doing so become the first openly transgendered player in the history of NCAA basketball.
Allums was born a girl, but began to question that label as an adolescent. First, she became a tomboy, then a lesbian and in college she decided to identify as male. Because of NCAA rules, Allums can’t undergo hormone therapy or surgery to physically become male if he wants to play for George Washington, but that doesn’t seem to be an issue at the present.
“The only thing I can’t do is take testosterone,” Allums said. “And I don’t need that anyway. I probably naturally have more than some of the guys on the guys’ team. If I get surgery, it doesn’t affect my play, it doesn’t enhance anything, I’m just taking something off my body, like if I lost a finger.”
His teammates, too, have been accepting of Allums’ choices.
“We were all just talking, a bunch of teammates, and he said that he’s a guy,” said teammate Brook Wilson. “At first I didn’t understand, and then he explained that sex is how you’re born and gender is how you identify yourself. Then I started to understand”
