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Posted Feb. 5, 2002

HSU still facing a tall task
They have been right on the cusp of the Final Four in each of the past three seasons, and Hardin-Simmons women's basketball coach Julie Goodenough admits that she doesn't know what it's going to take to get there.

If there were ever a season where the Cowgirls were going to reach that goal, this would be it. Hardin-Simmons is one of two unbeaten teams remaining in Division III.

"I think a big key to our success this year has just been good team effort,'' said Goodenough, whose team has sandwiched two Sweet 16 appearances around an Elite 8 showing in the previous trio of attempts at a national title. "We have three seniors and five juniors, who have played a lot of pressure-packed minutes. They've led and the underclassmen have followed them all year."

The Cowgirls have been winning games recently by large margins, but the contests will get tighter as the regular season draws to a close.

"We've found a way to win the close games this year,'' said Hardin-Simmons forward Kendra Anderson (left), referring to three victories in which the margin was five points or less. "When we're playing really well, we're hard to stop. When our defense gets rolling, it opens up more offense for us."

Indeed, Hardin-Simmons plays at a frenetic pace, keyed by a pressing defense that enabled it to score 127 points on opening night and 116 points in its most recent triumph. Anderson, a strong All-American candidate, leads the way at 16.8 ppg and 9.1 rpg, followed by Lauren Harris, Laura Ricci and Andrea Burrows, who combine for 28.6 ppg despite averaging only 21 minutes apiece.

"Kendra is a great leader and she's totally selfless," Goodenough said. "In return for that, I think, is why she's so successful. A lot of teams focus on her, so that gives Laura an opportunity to score a lot. Andrea is driven this year to take us as far as we can go. She's made big shots in all the close games we've had."

The Cowgirls have had trouble in past seasons dealing with the size that teams from the West region can throw at them. Three seasons ago it was Pacific Lutheran. Two seasons ago it was St. Thomas. Last year it was Baldwin-Wallace out of the Great Lakes.

"Athletically, we're definitely a better team than we've had in the past,'' Anderson said. "In the tournament, all those teams are big and fast, and hard to handle. That's more challenging for us."

The goal this year is to rise to that challenge. If Hardin-Simmons wants to look somewhere for inspiration, it can look to its academic success, where Goodenough has graduated all 16 seniors to come through her program and the team has maintained one of the highest GPAs in the nation.

"I credit that to our kids,'' Goodenough said. "A lot of their success comes from pressure from their teammates. They hold each other accountable."

SCHOOL COMES FIRST: Everyone knows that in Division III getting a degree is the most important thing, because the Devean Georges and Horace Jenkins only come around once or twice a decade.

Even so, while academic conflicts with practice are relatively frequent, missing a game is pretty rare.

Photo by Bathsheba Chong Conklin, 3M Ryan Gerry (left) is also an intern at 3M, working on ways to use results from the Human Genome Project to let physicians evaluate patients more quickly and accurately.

Not so for Ryan Gerry, who's missed a pair of games for Macalester so far while trying to catch on at a higher level.

You see, when an Ivy League institution offers you an interview for medical school, you go. Basketball takes a back seat.

"Harvard ... mailed me an invitation with the date preset," said Gerry, who started out at Division I Northern Arizona and also spent a year at Division II Minnesota-Morris before coming to Macalester. "I could have changed it, but I would not have been able to choose the next date and it would have been the final date. I decided that missing a regular-season game was better than the possibility of missing a postseason game."

Thankfully, Macalester beat Bethel 74-59 despite Gerry's absence. The 6-1 senior averages 8.6 points per game, but plays the most minutes on the team, which is 13-7 overall and fighting for a MIAC playoff home game or even a first-round bye at 11-4.

Gerry said he was especially thrilled to hear about that win. "I knew that we would play well on our home court though. We always play more focused at home." When Dartmouth gave him the option, he chose to miss an early January game at Hamline, which turned out to be an easy victory.

Easier, that is, than wedging in schoolwork on a Division I schedule.

"At NAU, I spent over four hours a day, during the school year, on basketball-related activities. At Mac, we spend much less time on the court and in the weight room. D-III is definitely a different world."

Ryan Gerry has started 18 games and is shooting 39% from 3-point range.

Gerry still managed a 3.94 GPA at Northern Arizona and was in contention for playing time before he tore a knee ligament.

"At Mac, I thought I could make a dramatic change in the way athletics, especially basketball, are viewed. The year before I came, I thought Coach (Curt) Kietzer had a talented team — they just needed leadership and some direction. They needed to expect to win; I knew that I could bring this to the table."

But regardless of whether Macalester can run the table through the MIAC tourney and reach the NCAA tournament, Gerry's future looks bright. He's already been accepted to one school, has an interview scheduled in a few weeks at Mayo Medical School, and still hopes to get interviews at high-level schools like Stanford, Johns Hopkins and Washington U.

It's quite a change from battling for a low-Division I backup shooting guard spot.

— Pat Coleman

MAKING THE MOST OF YOUR TIME: It occured to us after watching the Kings-Scranton women's game on Saturday that the one weakness of both teams was an inability to get the best usage out of its chances to score, due primarily to a speedy style of play.

To satisfy our interest, we decided to try to gauge which of the Top 10 teams (from last week's D3hoops.com Top 25 poll) get the best "value" from their opportunities. We did this (with help from stats we found on the Internet on Sunday morning) dividing a team's points per game by the number of scoring chances each team gets per game (average field goals attempted per game + average free throws attempted + average number of turnovers).

We'll call this stat, one that we guess has previously been compiled by hoops
afficionados — "Offensive Efficiency."

In layman's terms, this was done to determine which teams do the most with the ball. It should come as no surprise that Washington University had the best score.

We'll try to do some sort of statistical study on the men's side next week, and if it's well-received, try to make it a weekly feature.

MAKING THEIR MOVE: Early in the year, folks in the Atlantic Region had to be scratching their heads at the lightning-like disappearance of The College of New Jersey and Marymount women, as well as the William Paterson men, from the Top 25 poll.

Well, all three are making a pretty good late charge as the season nears its most important point. Dawn Henderson's Lions, a preseason No. 5 pick, sat in sixth place in the New Jersey Athletic Conference, then whipped each of the five teams in front of them in the standings by an average of 20 points to edge their way into third place. Bill Finney's Saints got All-American Candice Brown back from injury and are 11-1 with her in the lineup. They have won eight straight games.

The Pioneers have been buoyed by the midseason addition of senior point guard
Khalid Coursey, who coincidentally was steered towards the WPU program by
former All-American Horace Jenkins, himself a former midseason addition.
Jenkins, Coursey and forward Rashaan Barner all played summer basketball
together at Branch Brook Park in nearby Newark.

MILESTONES: Junior forward Heather Francoeur of Oglethorpe reached the
1,000-point mark for her career on Friday night (Jan. 25) against Trinity. It was the 56th game of her career, which is the quickest that any women's basketball player in SCAC history has reached the 1,000-point plateau. She surpassed the previous record of 58, which was the number of games it took the league's all-time leading scorer, Lauren Turnbow of Hendrix (1996-2000), to reach that mark ... She is the fourth SCAC player to reach 1,000 points this season, joining Mollie Scarbrough of Hendrix, Sarah Green of Centre, and Christina Forsyth of Rose-Hulman ... Also joining the 1,000-point club are Jen Lesnick (Lasell) and on the men's side Doug King of Salisbury ... Heidelberg senior Rachael Poland needed 18 points to break Dortha Ford's school record of 1,778 set from 1987-1990, and she got them all in the first half Monday of an 82-59 win against Earlham.

Notes for Around the Nation are compiled with the help of sports information directors across the country. If you have suggestions or information for this column, please send it to mark@d3hoops.com.

Previous columns
2007-08 columns
March 6: Faith restored
Feb. 27: John Jay, Cinderella
Feb. 21: No safety net
Feb. 14: Ursinus better enough
Feb. 8: Hope-TMC on collision course
Jan. 31: Plattsburgh's big shot
Jan. 24: UMD answers call
Jan. 18: Like Bosko, like son
Jan. 11: Keystone stakes
Dec. 13: Unstoppable
Dec. 7: UWW aiming deeper
Nov. 30: Coach's shadow lingers
Nov. 15: Strong duo
2006-07 columns
2005-06 columns
2004-05 columns
2003-04 columns
2002-03 columns
2001-02 columns

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