Hoop dreams: Mount Pearl woman courts NBA talent as one of the league's youngest agents

Stacey Leawood of Mount Pearl, N.L., seems to be constantly on the move, whether as a varsity track runner, a Memorial University student finishing her degree in Toronto — or, these days, flying around North America chasing her dream. 

Leawood, 24, has her sights set on one day running a team in the National Basketball Association. 

"My ultimate goal is to be the general manager of an NBA team," she told CBC News in a recent interview.

This year one of the league's youngest player agents recently landed her first client three consecutive 10-day contracts with the Los Angeles Clippers.

"This has been his dream his entire life and just being able to be the one to make that happen for somebody that deserves it so much is the most surreal thing that could possibly happen," she said.

But this isn't the story of overnight success.

Leawood has loved basketball her entire life and, as a player, was scouted by universities in Canada and the United States. 

She chose to stay closer to home and play for Memorial University in St. John's, but a shift in coaches with the program prompted her to switch from playing hoops to running track. 

Not long afterward, she moved from working toward a bachelor of commerce degree to a bachelor of business administration and, wishing to be in a bigger city, moved to Toronto in 2018 while continuing her MUN classes online.

Leawood fell fast and hard for life in a city with a National Basketball Association team.

"There are very few jobs in the world in basketball, let alone in Canada," she said. 

But that wasn't going to stop her from finding one, and she took an unpaid internship at a sports media company while she was completing her degree. 

"I got all the connections that I could find at the