Lady Vols #1 High School Recruits
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In terms of overall players that were either ranked #1 or won NPOY honors in HS, these are the ones I know of:
Mary Ostrowski, Bridgette Gordon, Lisa Harrison, Tiffany Woosley, Chamique Holdsclaw, Tamika Catchings, Kara Lawson, Shyra Ely, Ashley Robinson, Candace Parker, Sa'de Wiley-Gatewood, Mercedes Russell, Diamond DeShields (was ranked #1 in the class in her sophomore and junior years), and Evina Westbrook.
She also won the Naismith POY and Gatorade POY awards as a junior. She was the first player to win the Naismith Award as a junior, with Maya Moore being the second. She could've been the first junior to win the others, for all I know, but I remember at the time the Naismith Award was made out to be a big deal.
Only ASGR didn't have Candace ranked #1, because Jerry Gatewood was involved with the organization. But SWG won the Parade Magazine POY award in 2004. Keep in mind that Candace missed part of her senior year after a torn ACL. Everyone knew Candace was the best player in that class. She was a once-in-a-generation talent and had won more than one NPOY award as a junior. BlueStar definitely had her ranked #1 (I used to have those rankings bookmarked but the site has since been deleted). Sylvia Fowles was the consensus #2 player in that class with Lex and SWG both being top 5. IIRC, Tasha Humphery and Crystal Langhorne were ranked right behind them. When I think back to the top 5/6 players in that class, those are the ones that come to mind.
Mary Ostrowski, Bridgette Gordon, Lisa Harrison, Tiffany Woosley, Chamique Holdsclaw, Tamika Catchings, Kara Lawson, Shyra Ely, Ashley Robinson, Candace Parker, Sa'de Wiley-Gatewood, Mercedes Russell, Diamond DeShields (was ranked #1 in the class in her sophomore and junior years), and Evina Westbrook.
She also won the Naismith POY and Gatorade POY awards as a junior. She was the first player to win the Naismith Award as a junior, with Maya Moore being the second. She could've been the first junior to win the others, for all I know, but I remember at the time the Naismith Award was made out to be a big deal.
Only ASGR didn't have Candace ranked #1, because Jerry Gatewood was involved with the organization. But SWG won the Parade Magazine POY award in 2004. Keep in mind that Candace missed part of her senior year after a torn ACL. Everyone knew Candace was the best player in that class. She was a once-in-a-generation talent and had won more than one NPOY award as a junior. BlueStar definitely had her ranked #1 (I used to have those rankings bookmarked but the site has since been deleted). Sylvia Fowles was the consensus #2 player in that class with Lex and SWG both being top 5. IIRC, Tasha Humphery and Crystal Langhorne were ranked right behind them. When I think back to the top 5/6 players in that class, those are the ones that come to mind.
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Blue Star definitely had Candace ranked #1, though. It was ASGR that was smoking crack because SWG's stepdad was involved with them. They had Candace ranked like #4 or #5, lol. I swear the writing was on the wall from the get-go that he was going to be a thorn in Pat's side. What a wasted talent SWG was, and her traveling circus of a meddling family had a lot to do with that.
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Yeah, I remember SWG's wack job dad, and how she supposedly felt like a "robot" in Pat's system. Funny thing, Bobbitt sure didn't look like a robot leading the team to two titles in her place.
Unfortunately that highly touted class also arrived with injury problems. SWG had her moments here and at Maryland, but her knees were basically shot by the time she arrived to college (one reason I'm not optimistic about Jordan Walker this season). And I fully believe Parker missing her freshman season cost Pat another title...
Another funny thing is she didn't do jack crap at Maryland once she transferred there because she still had the same knees, and wound up not even finishing her eligibility. She never played a full season of college basketball. Her first season was cut short due to her tendonitis, her second season she cut short herself by transferring, which bled into her junior season (had to sit out until after Christmas). She redshirted her senior year and never played again after that.
100%. No way we don't win it all in Indy if Parker is on the team. Still remember Ely pulling a no-show in her last college game in her hometown.
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stllvf
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Durham was an example of someone creating a top list with a minimum of nationwide experience.
aside from an earlier thread - I have often wondered why the LVs didn't use Parker just in the March Madness time of her first year. Even then I did n't expect her to play for four years. She had rehabbed for nearly a year. ( yes I no, mightof, could of , never would.... but I did consider the idea back then. just another time a boarder was NOT listened to. smile
aside from an earlier thread - I have often wondered why the LVs didn't use Parker just in the March Madness time of her first year. Even then I did n't expect her to play for four years. She had rehabbed for nearly a year. ( yes I no, mightof, could of , never would.... but I did consider the idea back then. just another time a boarder was NOT listened to. smile
IIRC, Parker was cleared to practice around Christmas or so, and everyone thought she would make her debut sometime during conference play (Pat told Ely to prepare to play on the wing), but her knee simply kept swelling after practice once she was cleared so they shut her down around February or so. Not to mention had she been brought in for the NCAAT, had she been able to play, you risk messing with team chemistry with bringing in a new player that late. That team took quite a while to gel and looked like garbage to start the season (lost badly at Texas, lost to Duke at home, barely beat Temple at home, lost badly at Rutgers, beat Stanford but won on a 3 at the buzzer from Zolmam after blowing a huge lead). Honestly it was the UConn win that seemed to turn it around — and we should’ve lost that game, but Ann Strother missed 2/3 FTs at the end. By the time March rolled around, we had won the SECT and gotten a 1-seed. There was enough drama with the team surrounding Candace the following year with players not getting along with her (Anosike) and being jealous of her (Zolman). Plus, Shyra Ely really resented Candace because she would’ve been taking her position away from her, essentially. There is a reason why UT won a championship the next year with certain players being graduated and Candace and Nicky famously hashing out their issues and embracing their differences. We were a much better team despite it being dubbed Pat’s “least talented team ever” by Nancy Lieberman, and it was because of team chemistry more than anything.
To be fair, judging the rankings in hindsight is a helluva lot easier than doing the actual rankings of sometimes immature high school kids. There's no way to know for sure which super high school players will have already peaked in their senior year of high school, and which will blossom and develop further with more maturity and experience. Also, at least one of the #1s -- Ashley Robinson -- went on to suffer a devastating injury early in her college career that obviously affected her legacy. I have often wondered how good A-Rob could have been if she'd had a fully healthy career at Tennessee.
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Honestly, even Candace. I mean she got "healthy" but after her knee issues she wasn't the same player. People seem to forget that Candace had an ACL tear after her junior year of high school which caused her to miss some of her senior season, and then meniscus/cartilage surgery on the same knee which caused her to redshirt her first year at UT. (Pat said her knee was extremely swollen when she got to campus, and she had played for USAB that summer, so that makes me pissed off even more given what happened to her years later with the Olympic team given she played an entire summer on a knee that was swollen up like a beachball and they let her which may very well have caused her knee to worsen and made her redshirt.) She has talked about how it took away from her explosiveness and leaping ability. It's scary to think of how much better Candace actually could've been had it not been for that knee. Honestly, it's a miracle that she's still playing the game at her age.
It's really just a crying shame how knee injuries pretty much destroyed Cait McMahan's career and Vicki Baugh probably was on her way to being okay after the first ACL tear, but the second one clearly did her in. Candace had said Vicki was on her way to being Tennessee's next AA, and she was right. Kyra Elzy's career was pretty much ruined after her knee injury, too.
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