Lexington, KY.  – It is hard to believe that the University of Kentucky’s Women’s Basketball program is only celebrating its 30th anniversary this season, as a modern era varsity sport.  There was a Women’s Basketball varsity team at UK from 1903 to 1925, but the University senate passed a bill abolishing the sport for being “too strenuous” for females.  Watching this years team, fans might agree that they may have been right that women’s basketball may be “too strenuous”, but not for the women that are playing the game, rather for the record breaking amount of fans that attended the games and supported the new era in UK Women’s Basketball.        

The record-breaking attendance is largely due the excitement that has been generated by the university bringing in an accomplished coach from a perennial powerhouse in women’s basketball (Tennessee).  Mickie DeMoss was voted the NCAA Division I Top Assistant Coach in the nation two years ago and she immediately began to work on getting UK’s program back on the right track.  The women’s basketball team had only posted a total of 26 wins over the last THREE seasons and DeMoss was going to have to bring all the expertise that she had gathered coaching to jump start the sagging program. 

She began her road to Kentucky playing high school b-ball for Delhi High in Delhi, Louisiana.  From there, Mickie attended Louisiana Tech.  There, she averaged nearly 10 points per game and was a member of the 30-point club.  Scholastically, she earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Physical Education.  In a logical progression, her next stop was as an assistant coach at Memphis State where she also earned her Master’s Degree in Education.  From there, she became the first full-time coach for women’s basketball at Florida.  She left Florida to become a part of the then nationally ranked Auburn Tigers coaching staff.  After two years at Auburn, she was hired as Tennessee’s top assistant coach by Pat Summitt and remained there for 20 years prior to coming here to Kentucky.   

Just to touch on some of the accomplishments that Coach DeMoss has accrued so far are: 26 years of collegiate coaching; coached 22 NCAA tournament teams; was a part of six NCAA titles; participated in 13 Final Fours; coached 10 SEC Championship Teams and 10 SEC Tournament Championship Teams; and coached 24 All-Americans, 15 WNBA players, and nine Olympians.

Fans, players, and coaches have all bought into DeMoss’ “New Team - New Dream” philosophy that she has brought to the team this season.  Right from the start, she had stated her goals for this year.  “We’ve worked hard over the summer and preseason and I expect us to play with a lot of energy and I expect us to be a well-conditioned team.  Defensively, we have to influence our opponents’ offence more and be more aggressive on the defensive end.  As far as goals are concerned… if we do these things, we can finish in the top half of the conference.  We certainly have the ability to make the NCAA Tournament.”     

Looking back at the 2003-2004 UK Women’s Basketball regular season there are
many highs and low points in Mickie DeMoss’ first year at the helm.

Without a doubt, the lack of depth was the major contributing factor to this season being so grueling and for making many preseason goals unattainable.  Normally, when someone talks about a lack of depth on a team, they are referring to a team that has a solid starting five players, but after the staring five, the talent of the players that come off the bench drops off dramatically.  This was not the case with this season’s UK Hoops (which was the moniker that the UK Women’s Basketball team hung on themselves).  UK Hoops had a pretty solid starting five with guards- Angela Phillips and Jenny Pfeiffer, forwards- Sara Potts and Shambrica Jones, and center ‘Se-se’ Helm.  Then on the bench were guards- Danyelle Payne and Racquel Ellis, center- Jennifer Humphrey, and
forward- Keiko Tate and Afton Perry.

Prior to SEC play beginning, UK Hoops were showing signs that they were ready to take Kentucky Women’s Basketball into a new era- the DeMoss Era.  In
non-conference play UK Hoops had posted a respectable 8-5 record and were setting their sights on making the preseason goal of a NCAA Tournament bid a reality.  Then December 3rd, heir apparent to the center position for the 2004-2005 season, sophomore Jennifer “Lanky” Humphrey was diagnosis with achalasia.  This is a condition that affects the esophagus and although it isn’t considered a life-threatening ailment, it will require surgery and probably be career ending.  Humphrey’s loss caused a position change, as junior Keiko Tate would be called on to carry the load and spell Helm.  As if the Humphrey’s loss wasn’t enough, sophomore Jenny Pfeiffer contracted mono four games into SEC competition and missed the rest of the SEC season.  When Jenny Pfeiffer became ill, she was averaging nearly 12 points a game.  Her 85% free throw percentage and 37.2% 3-point shooting was sorely missed.  With Pfeiffer out of the starting line-up, Danyelle Payne stepped in with her senior experience to help lead the team.  With these two players unable to suit-up, it left a bench that was rather thin.  Senior Racquel Ellis saw a lot of minutes.  She started seven games and was the main substitute for both guards.  Freshman Afton Perry wasn’t allowed the normal luxury of becoming comfortable with college play.  This year her bath under fire at the forward position may have been tough on her this season, but the experience should benefit her through out the rest of her career.              

One of the great bright spots of the season has been Sara Potts.  Sara became the only the tenth player in UK history to join the 1000 point club in her junior year.  This season she also became UK’s All-Time 3-point Champion.  In three years, Potts has made 188 3-pointers out of 486 attempts for almost 39%.  Besides the 3-pointers, the young sharpshooter lead UK Hoops in most offensive
categories:  field goals made (159) and field goals attempted (406), most points
scored (452), most points per game (16.7), most steals (27), and minutes played
(36.2/game).  Sara ranked second on the team in free throws made (70) and attempted (90), assists (48), rebounds (172).  Next season, the team will definitely look to Sara Potts to not only lead the team on the floor, but off as well. 
   
Coach Mickie DeMoss summed up her first year.  “We’ve had an interesting year my first year at Kentucky.  We have been competitive in a lot of games.  We ended up with three wins in the conference and in our last regular season game at Georgia I thought we competed really hard.  Depth has been a little of a problem for us with people out sick and injured all year.  These kids have fought extremely hard and we’ve been competitive in most all of our games in the conference.”                

Next month, we’ll wrap this year’s season and take a close look at the 2004 senior class.

                                         
Remember if you don’t take the shot, you can’t score!

Copyright 2004 by Richard G. Herles
All Rights Reserved.
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