• Parker and Petrakova met in 2012 when Petrakova joined UMMC Ekaterinburg in Russia.
• They got married in December 2019, keeping their relationship secret.
• Petrakova started playing basketball at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette in 2002.

Candace Parker and Anna Petrakova, both professional basketball players, started as teammates, then became wives, and now they are expecting their third child together.

They first met in 2012 when Petrakova joined UMMC Ekaterinburg in Russia. Parker was already playing for the team during the WNBA offseason. They became close friends before their relationship turned romantic.

Parker asked Petrakova to marry him in early 2019, and they got married in December of the same year. They kept their relationship secret until two years later when they shared that they were married and going to have their first baby. They had a son named Airr in February 2022, who joined Parker’s daughter Lailaa from another relationship. In December 2023, they happily revealed that they’re expecting another baby.

“It’s been amazing to go through this again, and then obviously with my beautiful wife and my daughter [by my side],” Parker told. “Being able to see her as a sister, it’s been amazing.”

Who is Candace Parker’s wife? Let’s find out everything about Anna Petrakova and her relationship with the professional athlete.

In the beginning of 2002, Petrakova started playing basketball at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. At that time, she only knew a bit of English, which she learned from her older sister Marina, who had moved to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, in 2000.

“She’d just turned 17 the month prior, and it was my job to get her registered and enrolled in classes for that semester,” former academic coordinator Danny Cottonham recalled to the Daily Advertiser in 2018. “I was not very optimistic about Anna’s future. She spoke fluent Russian, but most of her other communication was with a smile.”

Almost four years later, she had an incredibly successful women’s basketball journey at the school. She became the first athlete ever to be awarded the Player of the Year in the Sun Belt Conference.

“I learned everything I know about work ethic there,” Petrakova said of her time at her alma mater. “I learned you can pave your own way and make your own mark if you work hard and mean well.”

She continued, “Lafayette was the perfect place for me. I didn’t know if I would feel welcomed or would I feel like an outcast, but that all went away that first day in Mr. [Cottonham]’s office.”

Basketball runs in Petrakova’s family. Her dad, Viktor Petrakov, used to play for CSKA Moscow in the EuroLeague and was also part of the national basketball team for the Soviet Union.

“Since I was 8, I played basketball almost nonstop, and it definitely paid off for me,” she told the Daily Advertiser. “I feel like I got really lucky. I never had any major injuries and I chose when to finish my career and wasn’t forced to stop.”

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“Lafayette and the Cajuns were a huge step for me. I loved all of it. I would do it all over again and wouldn’t change a thing,” Petrakova added.

After finishing at the University of Louisiana, she became a professional basketball player with the team Nur in Kazan, Russia. She played for various teams during her career, such as Spartak, CSKA Moscow, Chevakata Vologda, Dynamo Kursk, and UMMC Ekaterinburg, as noted by the International Basketball Federation.

She retired from playing after the 2016–2017 season and then took on the role of an assistant coach for the Russian National Team.

In 2012, Petrakova joined UMMC Ekaterinburg, the team where Parker played during the WNBA offseason. They shared with TIME that they had their first kiss one evening after practice. The couple often posted pictures together from team events on social media.

“There were some drunken nights,” Petrakova told the outlet. “And it would just go further than we would think.”

Remembering their first kiss, Petrakova said, “We’re scared, and we’re like, ‘What the hell was that?’ You are kind of scared to look each other in the eye and then you’re like, ‘Okay, well, what are we? We’re lying to ourselves here.’ ”

Parker and Petrakova are also mom and dad. Parker has a daughter named Lailaa Nicole with her ex-husband, former NBA player Shelden Williams. They got married in 2008 but separated in 2016, citing “irreconcilable differences.”

Apart from raising Lailaa, Parker and Petrakova had their first child together on February 11, 2022. Petrakova gave birth to their son, and they named him Airr Larry Petrakov Parker.

“We are in absolute love and utter appreciation that Goose chose us. Welcome to the fam SON🥺🥰❤️😭😭😭,” Parker wrote on Instagram.

In a post on Instagram on December 14, 2023, Parker and Petrakova announced they’re going to have their third baby. They celebrated the news with basketball-themed photos featuring the whole family and a tiny onesie. This announcement coincided with their fourth anniversary, making it an extra special day for them.

“After four years in the game we are focused on building our roster. We know this rookie will add to our depth chart and contribute versatility to our team,” the caption on the post said. “The rookie will join our current roster consisting of a shooter, point forward, rebounder, and little Tikes rim attacker! The team as a whole struggles with clock management and a little bit on the defensive end. We are hoping the young buck will play their role, bring iQ, hustle, length, athleticism and passion to this team.”

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Petrakova played for Russia’s Women’s National Basketball Team in the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, where they finished fourth. Later, she took part in the 2014 Winter Olympics torch relay to Sochi, Russia.

In 2015, she received the Player of the Year award in the Russian Premier League and is known as one of the most successful female players in the country.

In 2012, she won the EuroCup Women’s Championship with Dynamo Kursk. The next year, with UMMC Ekaterinburg, she became a champion in EuroLeague Women and also secured the FIBA Europe SuperCup Women title.

While basketball is something she loves, Petrakova also enjoys various other sports. She shares pictures of activities like yoga, pilates, swimming, beach volleyball, and aerial silk work. In 2016, she gave paddleboarding a shot for the first time and credited her teammate Ticha Penicheiro for introducing her to it. Petrakova was pleased that she managed to stay on the board without falling during her first attempt.

“What do you call #paddleboarding in Russian? Serfing s veslom? Learned, practiced, recommended!! Especially in warm water and at sunset in #miami,” she wrote on Instagram alongside a photo of her in the water. “Paddleboarding with the best crew!”

In April 2019, Petrakova celebrated her birthday in Mexico with Parker. During the celebration on a boat with 15 family members and friends, Parker proposed to Petrakova. Their daughter Lailaa brought out a cake that had a special message, “Will you marry us?”

“She knows that Lailaa is the center of my entire universe,” Parker told TIME. “So we come in a package deal. It was important for the dynamic duo to be upgraded to the Big Three.”

They got married in December 2019 and successfully kept their engagement and wedding a secret until two years later. On December 14, 2021, they revealed their marriage and announced that they were expecting.

Petrakova mentioned to TIME that both she and Parker were not expecting their relationship to become romantic. “We literally denied it to ourselves for three years, I think,” she said. “Then we just finally accepted it. That was a long, hard process.”

“I always tell my daughter to be herself. I always tell my daughter to be proud of who she is,” Parker explained. “And I always tell my daughter to speak for herself and speak up for those that she loves. And I can’t say that to her if I’m not doing it myself.”

She continued, “I don’t want her to ever think that I’m ashamed or not proud of our family. That was a step that we had to take. But we had to take it on our own terms.”

In regards to coming out publicly, “I felt like in this society, in this day and age, you shouldn’t have to do that,” Parker said — but she and Petrakova decided to do so in order to “open up the door of conversations” and remind people “how valuable it is to have support.”

“Society had a way of putting this pressure on people to come out. And I don’t think it should be that way,” she added. “I think there were a number of media members who knew about my family. And they supported it. They didn’t out me. Or they didn’t put pressure on me to expose my living situation.”

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