Ready to take charge: UO point guard opens her senior year with something to prove
By BOB RODMAN
The Register-Guard
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"I want to maximize the team's potential, to get on my teammates so they will be better than even they thought they were."
- Shaquala Williams, UO senior point guard
Behind the game face, the icy stare and the warrior-like approach, there is a softer, kinder, gentler Shaquala Williams.
Really, there is.
"When basketball is over, I'm another person," said Williams, a 5-foot-6 senior point guard for the Oregon women's basketball team whose win-at-almost-any-cost mentality seems to have been with her since she took her first charge.
"I can be a silly, goofy, laid-back person," she said. "I don't have to be that serious."
But she often is. Williams is driven to be the best she can be, and driven to make sure those around her follow suit.
Shaquala Williams, a 5-foot-6 point guard for the Oregon women's basketball team, enters her final season as the outspoken leader of the Ducks.
Photo: CHRIS PIETSCH / The Register-Guard
For the most part, it has worked.
Now in her fifth year, the result of a knee injury forcing a redshirt season in 2000-01, she and the rest of the Ducks are gathering for Saturday's official start of practice for the 2002-03 season.
Williams, long the star for Oregon, continues to glitter despite ruffling a few feathers while she feathers the Ducks' nest:
With Williams in the lineup, the Ducks have an overall record of 70-27 and a Pac-10 Conference record of 39-15 - both winning percentages of .722.
She has helped lead the Ducks to two NCAA Tournament appearances, one outright Pac-10 title and a share of another, and a Women's National Invitation Tournament championship.
She is a three-time Pac-10 all-conference player, twice honorably mentioned as an All-American, was the first freshman in UO history to be named Pac-10 freshman of the year and just the fourth in conference history to be named all-league.
Three times she has led the Ducks in scoring and free-throw shooting percentage, twice led Oregon in assists and once led the team in three-point field goal percentage.
She holds the Pac-10 single-season free-throw percentage record (.908) and ranks first on the UO career list for free-throw percentage (.841), third in three-point field goals (141), fifth in assists (360) and sixth in scoring (1,436).
All that, and seldom without something to say, a characteristic of Williams since she landed on the Ducks' pond as a freshman in 1998 and wondered aloud why she was not starting.
"She can be a little headstrong," said the woman who knows Williams best, her mother, Betty Clay. "Sometimes she needs to tone that down a little, but overall she has a great heart.
"She has her moments but I am so proud of her. She's my baby, and she's worked so hard."
Williams is not inclined to slow down, let alone back down.
"I'm still outspoken but that's who I am," she said. "It drives some people crazy but that's me. I've tried to take the `Oh, golly gee' route and it's not me. If I have something to say, I say it."
But this also is the same 22-year-old who anticipates a law career (after basketball), who covets her family, a chosen few close friends and still possesses "the little girl in her."
"She's a private person," her mother said. "Few people get to see the side of her that so much loves animals - there was this little kitten she was so attached to - and how she would hide behind her grandmother when there were too many people around the house."
Now, however, it is back to business as Williams and the Ducks fly into a season steeped in potential with the return of three starters, eight letter-winners, its leading scorer (Williams) and its No. 1 rebounder (Cathrine Kraayeveld).
"This team," second-year coach Bev Smith said, "will have more daring, be more dynamic" when it opens the season on Nov. 22 against Gonzaga at McArthur Court.
Last season was a transitory one for the Ducks, Smith and Williams. The team was dealing with a new coaching staff led by Smith, a Canadian and legendary player for Oregon with Olympic credentials as a player and coach.
Williams was dealing with a comeback season after sitting out a year because of a knee injury, playing a new position (she was moved from the point to off-guard) and adjusting to the new coaching regime.
"It was a tough season for me," said Williams, whose competitive fire was lit in her early years as a female playing basketball in a male arena. "I set a standard for myself, and I didn't meet that standard last year."
While the Ducks struggled early, they finished with a 22-13 record (the fifth 20-win season in the last nine years) and that WNIT title. Williams led the team in scoring (16.3) and assists (4.1), set a UO record with 31 consecutive free throws and shot a career-best 42 percent from the floor.
"I feel I have something to prove," said Williams, that familiar headband seemingly tightening. "It's not about me being the best of all-time but about how much better I can make the team.
"And this team can be a very special one. It has a good mix of youth that is hungry and experience that has been through the good and the bad. And if I'm at my best, I can make my team better."
Smith agreed.
"Shaquala is very, very important to us," Smith said. "She takes a lot of raps for shooting the ball a lot but she led our team in scoring last year. She leads the team. She is a team player."
Said Williams, "Look at what Joey (Harrington) and Freddie (Jones) did for the Oregon football and men's basketball teams (respectively). That's what I want to do."
Williams, who struggled in the WNIT with an average of eight points and shot just 28 percent from the field, still managed to get the ball to Kraayeveld in the final seconds for the field goal that beat Houston to secure the tournament title.
Williams and Kraayeveld, a 6-4 junior forward, supplied nearly one-third of the Ducks' points last season.
Williams dished out a team-high 137 assists and was No. 2 in steals with 46. Kraayeveld, a 6-4 junior, snagged a team-best 191 rebounds and blocked a team-high 41 shots.
"They are talented, experienced and they are playing well," Smith said. "They are the keys."
Two other seniors, guards Alissa Edwards and Kourtney Shreve, lend depth and experience for a UO program that has strung together nine straight winning seasons and made eight NCAA Tournament appearances in the last nine years.
Andrea Bills, a 6-3 sophomore center, became a starter midway through last season and shot 50 percent from the floor.
Brandi Davis, a talented sophomore who sat out last season as a partial qualifier, is the tallest of the guards at 6-feet. Sophomore forwards Amy Parrish and Kedzie Gunderson return. Junior college transfer Kayla Steen and sophomore Amy Taylor deepen the talent pool at guard.
The two freshmen are 6-3 center Carolyn Ganes and 6-2 forward Yadili Okwumabua, both from Canada and both with Canadian national team experience.
Ineligible this season because of the NCAA transfer rule are guards Corrie Mizusawa, from Saint Mary's of Moraga, Calif., and Springfield's Chelsea Wagner, from Hawaii.
"We are two-deep at every position," Smith said. "We have a good perimeter presence. The post play is strong. The challenge will be our overall quickness."
And the goal, as always, is dominance in the Pac-10 and a push as deep into the NCAA Tournament as possible.
The WNIT was OK, Smith said, but the NCAA is the target. "We need to be there," she said.
2002-03 OREGON WOMEN'S BASKETBALL SCHEDULE
NOVEMBER Date Day Opponent Time 9 Sat. Basketball Travelers (exhibition) 5 p.m. 15 Friday Southern Oregon (exhibition) 7 p.m. 22 Friday Gonzaga 5 p.m. 26 Tuesday at Wisconsin-Green Bay 5 p.m. 28 Tuesday Paradise Jam, St. Thomas, V.I. (S. Carolina) 5 p.m. 29 Thursday Paradise Jam (Boston College) 4:30 p.m.DECEMBER Date Day Opponent Time 5 Thursday Portland 7 p.m. 7 Saturday at PapAll times Pacific and subject to changeAll games broadcast on KUGN-AM (590) or KUIK-AM (1360) radioz - denotes games scheduled to be telecast on Fox Sports NetROSTER Player Ht. Yr./Exp. Home Andrea Bills 6-3 So./1L Moreno Valley, Calif. Brandi Davis 6-0 So./SQ La Habra, Calif. Alissa Edwards 5-7 Sr./3L Hermiston Carolyn Ganes 6-3 Fr./HS Saskatoon, Saskatchewan Kedzie Gunderson 6-0 So./1L Bellevue, Wash. Cathrine Kraayeveld 6-4 Jr./2L Kirkland, Wash. Corrie Mizusawa 5-8 Jr./TR Lafayette, Calif. Yadili Okwumabua 6-2 Fr./HS Winnipeg, Manitoba Amy Parrish 6-2 So./1L Hanford, Calif. Kourtney Shreve 5-7 Sr/3L Albany Kayla Steen 5-8 Jr./TR Hillsboro Amy Taylor 5-7 So./1L Shoreline, Wash. Chelsea Wagner 5-10 So./TR Springfield Shaquala Williams 5-6 Sr./3L Portland NOTE - Mizusawa and Wagner ineligible 2002-03 season because of NCAA transfer rule.More UO basketball coverage:DuckHoops page
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Copyright 2002 The Register-Guard
unless labeled as being from the Associated Press (AP),in which case Copyright 2002 Associated Press
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