Natalie Bellemare

Natalie Bellemare
(Atlantic Puffin, C/F)
ID# 946

No. 17 – Plymouth Taproots
Position	Bigfur
Species	Atlantic Puffin ( Alcidae )
Gender	Female
Personal information
Born	Percé, QC, Canada
Nationality	Canadian
Listed height	7 ft 0 in (2.13 m)
Listed weight	225 lb (102 kg)
Shoots	Right
Career information
College	Université Canadienne de la Faune de Montréal
FBA draft	2016 / Round: 1 / Pick: 20th overall
Selected by the Seattle Summit
Pro playing career	2016–present
Career history
2016-2018	Seattle Summit
2018-present	Plymouth Taproots
Career highlights and awards
FBA Champion (2020) FBA Rookie All-Star (2017) Olympics (2020 Gold, 2024 Bronze)
Contract information
Contract year	2024
2026 Salary	$11 million
2027 Salary	$11 million
2028 Salary	$11 million
Player Contacts
(IC) Agent	Unknown
(OOC) Creator	MartineauQC
(OOC) Actor	Unknown
(OOC) Usage	Ask me before any use

Natalie Bellemare is a Canadian professional basketball player for the Seattle Summit of the Furry Basketball Association (FBA).

Early Life

Nathalie was born in the beautiful touristic village of Percé, province of Québec, Canada. Life was simple and wonderful for young Nathalie, her mom worked at a seafood restaurant and her dad was a Boat tour guide for Bonaventure island, one of the village main sight as well as the famous Percé Rock, a national natural marvel in Canada. Life was good for the young Puffin, as she enjoyed nature and how lively the village was, especially in the summer during the tourist boom. Natalie was an easygoing and peaceful child always willing to welcome people coming to her village and show them the best sights. She loved the contact with the sea, that she started to work at a very young age helping a father's friend on a lobster boat. Hardwork never was an issue for her, as she soon started handling live lobsters and cages. One of her dream was to own her very own seafood shop with fresh produce from her beloved Gaspésie Peninsula.

On a social level, she didn't seemed to have much of a problem even for the fact that she was a tall puffin. Being nearly over 6 foot tall in her adolescence made it a little awkward at times, but people in the regions where a kind and tolerant people, so it was never a problem for Natalie in making friends. She was a good student at school, as well of a great basketball player. Been taller than others had its advantage sure, but the sport grown quickly on her, as she shown the same exuberance for the sport then her work on the sea. She been highlighted many times as a Future regional athlete by local newspapers and Regional sports blogs. She often cited that her favorite FBA team was the Winnipeg Voyageurs and her favorite players was Dirk Von Stryker and of course, now team captain, Yves Carbonneau.

Life seemed to be going well, until the a tough economic recession and a slowdown in touristic activities had Nathalie's parents lose both their jobs. With not much options left, They decided to move closer to the center of Québec, where relatives of theirs helped them find employment. A move that displeased Nathalie, has she done anything in her power to help her parents find work, but to no avail. So with a heavy heart, Nathalie had to say good bye to Percé as her family moved to Saint-Jérome, a town sitting sitting by the outskirts of Montreal, Québec.

Life in the city, high school career and recruitment to UCF

As Nathalie begun attending high school in the city, She had trouble adapting to her new environment far from nature and the sea. Not to mention that while people in regions are more caring, city people was much less forgiving. With her tall stature and her funny region accent she was the butt of many jokes, and had barely a couple of friends. Her parents tried their best to help her, as they managed to find her at a local seafood shop, but the quality of the product sold and the fact that the shop owner mistook trout meat for salmon left her disgusted and she quit shortly after. She then vowed to herself that she will one day have her own shop and show city people what REAL seafood is like.

In the meantime, having not much going for her, she decided to concentrate on the only things she was still competent enough and appreciated for; her basketball skills. Doubling down on her training, she soon rose to the top and helped her high school won several inner city tournaments, even so went head-to-head with Texas Lone stars player François Martineau a couple of times. With many accomplishments and sports scholarships earned, she soon begun to catch the eye of many colleges recruiters in order to convince her to come join them. But her mind was clear on that subject, in order to stand out, there was only one college she wanted to go to: L'Université Canadienne de la Faune de Montréal. She would end her high school career with pretty much all the scoring records, as well of having one of the best shooting percentage for a center at her play level, one attribute that would make her a very valuable prospect in the eyes of college basketball recruiters.

College career at UCF

Around 2014, she enrolled to UCF thanks to a substantial scholarship she received from a Regional Sports gala award ceremony backed by the Québec Government itself, and the scholarship was handed over by the the Minister of Sports and Recreations himself. So she had huge expectations onto her as she came in, especially with the UCF was one of the best basketball program in the whole country. She still needed to make her place thought, as she would then be approach by a member of the team, Genesis Azocar, a Canadian-Mexican cat. She would soon build a friendship with her, as she was the head of her own little clique within the team, as they welcomed her back. Never been welcomed and approached as such since she moved in the city, she couldn't resist enjoying the attention. But as she continues to practice and mingle with them, she would soon starting to doubt her association with them on occasion, especially how mean she was with fellow player and now FBA star for the Hawaii Kahunas, Julian Cross Kiraly.

Genesis was at odds with Julian, and Natalie was right into it. When she even went as far as putting laxatives into Kiraly drink to mess up his game, Bellemare didn't know what to think. But she continued to follow anyway. Everything came to a head as Genesis was eventually kicked out from the team, as they ended up representing Québec in the 2014 CFIS National Title tournament. The team did well, but eventually fell to finalist AUH, led by Edwin Griega. Natalie did well for her team, managing to score just about 10.2 points per game as well of having a flawless shooting and free throw percentage, earning rookie of the year honors for the Québec Division.

As the team was heading for the 2015 season, Natalie had to face constant pressure from her friend Genesis, now no longer with the team, as she continued her college basketball career. Having invested so much into it at this point, Natalie made her known she couldn't just let it go and broke ties with her after a loud dispute. It was a tough blow for her, but the puffin still had a couple of friends left from Genesis's group that remained on the team. As usual, UCF was the front runners in representing Québec once again for the National tournament, as they continued playing hard during the season. Natalie game continued to improve, as she constantly earned double-doubles on a consistent basis, even averaging around 23.6 points per game, making her a threat at the Center position. She would eventually earn several College player of the month awards and earned a spot on the first National all-star team in the CFIS that year. As playoffs came around, nothing seemed to be getting in their way, that until they faced UAL in the Provincial finals, lead by their inspirational top scorer François Martineau. In a final game that needed overtime to settle the score, UAL managed to pull off the historic upset at the time and beat UCF 113-110. UAL would then go on and represent Québec for the first time in their history, while Montreal would be forced to watch the National tournament at home.

This loss was devastating to Natalie in so many levels. Not only this was a blow for the team, but recent tribulations and attitude issues within the team (that was put into light prior by Julian Cross-Kiraly) led UCF to clean house in the program, as several players and friends of Natalie's left the team, and was held responsible for the team humiliating defeat. Being the only one left from the old era of the team, she became sort of a pariah to her teammates in an internal level. That left Natalie really bitter about the whole thing, as her last college came around the corner in 2016. While she was still a great prospect in everyone books for the 2016 FBA draft, it was with a monkey on her back and a desire to prove everyone wrong that she this year as the moment to really breakout and make her presence felt as a future FBA superstar.

Stats

Regular Season Career Stats

Season	Team	G	Min	FGM	FGA	3PtM	3PtA	FTM	FTA	Off	Reb	Ast	TO	Stl	Blk	PF	Pts	MPG	FG%	TP%	FT%	RPG	APG	TPG	SPG	BPG	FPG	PPG	Ast/TO
2016-17	SEA	75	831.5	34	118	0	2	4	11	37	220	0	14	2	6	46	72	11.1	0.288	0.000	0.364	2.9	0.0	0.2	0.0	0.1	0.6	1.0	0.0
2017-18	SEA	80	1035.6	158	291	0	0	40	50	51	225	68	78	28	13	59	356	12.9	0.543	0.000	0.800	2.8	0.8	1.0	0.3	0.2	0.7	4.5	0.9
2018-19	PLY	79	1459.4	253	474	0	0	131	157	89	349	127	76	59	38	139	637	18.5	0.534	0.000	0.834	4.4	1.6	1.0	0.7	0.5	1.8	8.1	1.7
2019-20	PLY	80	1452.0	229	427	0	0	140	173	86	403	128	92	54	39	124	598	18.1	0.536	0.000	0.809	5.0	1.6	1.1	0.7	0.5	1.6	7.5	1.4
2020-21	PLY	80	2363.7	360	868	0	0	326	403	152	644	183	148	69	50	284	1046	29.5	0.415	0.000	0.809	8.1	2.3	1.9	0.9	0.6	3.5	13.1	1.2
2021-22	PLY	80	1755.7	200	454	0	0	208	252	90	498	150	113	44	19	184	608	21.9	0.441	0.000	0.825	6.2	1.9	1.4	0.6	0.2	2.3	7.6	1.3
2022-23	PLY	79	2610.7	403	835	0	0	365	420	156	794	272	147	89	46	299	1171	33.0	0.483	0.000	0.869	10.1	3.4	1.9	1.1	0.6	3.8	14.8	1.9
2023-24	PLY	79	2369.6	386	845	0	0	346	402	136	690	222	168	77	41	248	1118	30.0	0.457	0.000	0.861	8.7	2.8	2.1	1.0	0.5	3.1	14.2	1.3
2024-25	PLY	79	2444.1	424	852	0	0	311	373	141	678	235	154	74	36	234	1159	30.9	0.498	0.000	0.834	8.6	3.0	1.9	0.9	0.5	3.0	14.7	1.5
2025-26	PLY	80	2047.1	298	647	0	0	258	308	120	579	174	131	56	50	201	854	25.6	0.461	0.000	0.838	7.2	2.2	1.6	0.7	0.6	2.5	10.7	1.3
Career Total		791	18369.4	2745	5811	0	2	2129	2549	1058	5080	1559	1121	552	338	1818	7619	23.2	0.472	0.000	0.835	6.4	2.0	1.4	0.7	0.4	2.3	9.6	1.4

Playoff Career Stats

Season	Team	G	Min	FGM	FGA	3PtM	3PtA	FTM	FTA	Off	Reb	Ast	TO	Stl	Blk	PF	Pts	MPG	FG%	TP%	FT%	RPG	APG	TPG	SPG	BPG	FPG	PPG	Ast/TO
2016-17	SEA	11	138.0	10	13	0	0	0	0	14	56	0	1	0	0	4	20	12.5	0.769	0.000	0.000	5.1	0.0	0.1	0.0	0.0	0.4	1.8	0.0
2017-18	SEA	17	175.5	27	53	0	0	4	6	10	39	20	2	6	3	11	58	10.3	0.509	0.000	0.667	2.3	1.2	0.1	0.4	0.2	0.6	3.4	10.0
2018-19	PLY	18	316.0	59	102	0	0	31	34	17	66	29	20	10	12	23	149	17.6	0.578	0.000	0.912	3.7	1.6	1.1	0.6	0.7	1.3	8.3	1.4
2019-20	PLY	25	392.5	49	91	0	0	38	47	22	126	21	18	12	10	31	136	15.7	0.538	0.000	0.809	5.0	0.8	0.7	0.5	0.4	1.2	5.4	1.2
2020-21	PLY	10	294.6	37	95	0	0	43	49	7	62	24	13	9	10	21	117	29.5	0.389	0.000	0.878	6.2	2.4	1.3	0.9	1.0	2.1	11.7	1.8
2021-22	PLY	6	144.2	8	31	0	0	19	24	4	31	6	7	2	5	14	35	24.0	0.258	0.000	0.792	5.2	1.0	1.2	0.3	0.8	2.3	5.8	0.9
2022-23	PLY	12	358.7	56	117	0	0	44	50	21	104	37	23	8	6	44	156	29.9	0.479	0.000	0.880	8.7	3.1	1.9	0.7	0.5	3.7	13.0	1.6
2023-24	PLY	13	429.2	79	144	0	0	67	72	9	99	53	20	13	15	44	225	33.0	0.549	0.000	0.931	7.6	4.1	1.5	1.0	1.2	3.4	17.3	2.6
2024-25	PLY	19	607.5	102	210	0	0	99	109	26	163	61	41	18	14	56	303	32.0	0.486	0.000	0.908	8.6	3.2	2.2	0.9	0.7	2.9	15.9	1.5
Career Total		131	2856.2	427	856	0	0	345	391	130	746	251	145	78	75	248	1199	21.8	0.499	0.000	0.882	5.7	1.9	1.1	0.6	0.6	1.9	9.2	1.7