Hansen making an impact

There are plenty of Americans who make good and bad impressions in Moscow, but Travis Hansen may be in a league of his own.

The former BYU, Utah Valley and Mountain View High star is one of a

few multimillionaire basketball players who play in the Euro League. A

star for Dynamo Moscow, Hansen was named to the All-Eurocup team on

Friday, March 27, and will lead his team to the Final Eight in Torino, Italy, this

week.Hansen leads Dynamo in scoring and steals. His 16.2 scoring average

ranks fourth in Eurocup overall, and his Eurocup index rating of 17.5

ranks ninth in the league.

Hansen is a tenacious defender, and his offense spans a game in

which he can play all four positions on the court. That he holds a

Russian passport makes this former resident of Orem even more

intriguing to the Russian press.

But as good as Hansen has been as a professional, it's his work off

the court with charity in that country that has brought him both

national and worldwide attention.Russia's largest sports magazine

recently put Hansen on the cover of a feature article titled

"Missionaries."

More than two years ago, Hansen's wife, LaRee, who was struggling to

have another child, looked into adoption in Russia. What she discovered

was a nightmare, a world of forgotten orphans living under

heart-breaking conditions, a system overloaded and burdened with

fallout from the country's rampant alcoholism and broken families.

LaRee told Travis they had to do something. "Even if it was just for one child, we have to help."More than two years later, the Little Heroes Foundation, created by