Alexander and her sister were taken in by Lewis and their grandmother, Flaxie Lewis, who gave them love and support. Alexander, however, still had a chip on her shoulder and a bigger hole in her heart. It didn't help that she was the biggest girl in her class, leaving her a target of ridicule, taunting and occasional physical confrontations.
"I went through a time where I was just so angry," Alexander said. "I didn't understand why this happened."
Alexander played two years for Harbor City Narbonne High, helping the Gauchos to a City Section title in 2003. However, she began falling behind in academics and was forced to enroll in night school to stay on course to graduate.
"My uncle sat me down and asked, 'Is this how you want to live?' " Alexander remembers.
Finally, after a disagreement with her coach at Narbonne, which she said stemmed from her participation in an off-season tournament, Alexander accepted an offer from the principal at IMG Academy in Florida to attend the sports training facility, which houses athletes from various disciplines.
Alexander was able to repeat her junior year, play for a local public high school and improve her academics enough that she received a full athletic scholarship from her dream school, UCLA. Two years later, Alexander is the team's starting center.
"I'm so happy, so thankful that I got a chance to come to this school," Alexander said. "There were so many times when people would tell me I'm not going to make it."
Going into the weekend, Alexander had started 14 of 21 games, averaging 4.1 points and 3.6 rebounds. She sat out last Saturday's loss at Stanford after suffering a possible concussion two days earlier at California but came off the bench Friday against visiting Washington State, totaling six points and three rebounds in 10 minutes.
"Every day she's improving," said UCLA Coach Kathy Olivier. "I told her, 'You are this close to breaking out, just an inch away.' "
It's in the moments after a game, when teammates are hugging their mothers and trading pecks on the cheek, that Alexander often feels most affected by her loss. When she scored a career-high 11 points on five-for-five shooting from the field Dec. 19 against visiting Tennessee, ranked No. 1 in the nation at the time, Alexander was especially aware of her mother's absence.
"I was so happy I had a good game," Alexander said. "I just wish, you know, that my mom could have been there."
That's why she can't wait to wear pink on Sunday.
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dan.arritt@latimes.com
