Bahar Çağlar

Bahar Çağlar — Biography

Bahar Çağlar Ökten is a retired power forward who won the 2013-14 EuroLeague Women title with Galatasaray and played at two Olympics with the national team. She won silver at the 2011 European Championship and bronze at the 2013 edition. On 7 August 2023 she announced on social media that she was ending her active career.

She took up basketball in the fifth grade of primary school at the urging of her physical education teacher, rose from her school team to the youth national teams and finished runner-up in Turkey with the İzmir İnönü High School team. Despite offers from Istanbul, she began her professional career at Ceyhan Belediyespor. She joined Galatasaray in 2008 and stayed eight seasons, winning the EuroCup in her first season, the EuroLeague Women in 2013-14, the Süper Lig in 2013-14 and 2014-15, and five Turkish Cups in a row from 2009-10 to 2013-14. In 2016 she moved to Yakın Doğu Üniversitesi, where she won the Süper Lig, Turkish Cup and EuroCup in her first season and the Presidents Cup and Turkish Cup in 2017-18. She then captained Beşiktaş for two seasons and played for BOTAŞ, Hatayspor and Emlak Konut in turn.

She played nearly 200 games for the senior national team and was at the 2012 London and 2016 Rio Olympics. She had a significant share in Beşiktaş's low-budget squad beating expectations. After retiring she told NTV Spor that she would not drift away from basketball.