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(11/15/13 2:50am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Freshman Karlee McBride admits there’s a sibling rivalry between her and her older sister, Kayla, a senior at Notre Dame. The rivalry isn’t as big as it used to be though, and Karlee can tell why. “Our mom doesn’t let us play against each other anymore,” Karlee said. “We’re just very competitive, and it can lead to some altercations.”Despite this, Karlee says her sister remains a great role model and someone she always looks up to. “It’s always been a rivalry, but we’re very close,” Karlee said. “It’s more of a love thing than a hate thing.”Kayla also gave her advice before she began her collegiate career at IU.“You just have to keep working hard, it gets rough everyday, but you just have to keep pushing through,” Karlee said.She said the biggest adjustment in the transition from the high school to the college level has been the conditioning.“Every little thing is a big aspect of the game,” Karlee said. “Just being focused all day and in every practice is huge.”Karlee is from Erie, Pa. She said basketball is huge in her hometown and it’s always been competitive.“I thought my town was a big basketball town, but it’s huge here,” she said. “Everyone knows you here, everyone knows you’re on the women’s basketball team, the men’s basketball team.” Karlee originally committed to Bowling Green when IU Coach Curt Miller was a head coach there. After IU hired Miller, she decommitted from Bowling Green and committed to IU.“I remember getting a phone call from Coach Miller saying that he was coming here,” she said. “I always wanted to play for Coach Miller. He’s the reason why I’m here today.”Karlee is one of seven freshman and nine total first-year players on IU Coach Curt Miller’s roster this season. She said it’s a good feeling being one of the first-year players.“It’s good to see all that we can bring to the team,” Karlee said. “It’s actually quite nice to follow the seniors and their positivity and their leadership.”“It really helps us get through the hard times that we think that we can never get through.”In the fifth grade, Karlee was a cheerleader. However, after seeing her older sister play basketball, she said she decided to play, too. “I wanted to be just like my sister,” Karlee said. “Watching my sister play definitely made me want to play basketball, too.”Basketball runs in the McBride family. In addition to her sister playing at Notre Dame, Karlee’s Olivia Schmidt from Buffalo, N.Y., who is already being recruited as a freshman in high school. “She’s gonna get there,” Karlee said. “She’s really good, she’s a good athlete — that’s on my mom’s side.”She said that basketball mostly runs on her mom’s side of the family. “But my dad is our coach,” Karlee said. Players and coaches both praised Karlee for her efforts as a freshman. Senior Tabitha Gerardot said Karlee has a nice touch when she’s comfortable with her shot and sees a lot of potential in her.“She’s shown a willingness to do extra work,” Gerardot said. Miller said the team has been affectionately referring to her as the microwave.“She’s on the white team a lot, and that second unit provides the offensive spark,” Miller said. “She can really warm up.”Follow women’s basketball reporter Stuart Jackson on Twitter @Stuart_Jackson1.
(11/15/13 2:40am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Jimmy Colloton patiently works with a men’s practice player, explaining the next play to run during a women’s basketball practice Oct. 28. He takes his time and carefully points out the specific spots on the floor the player will move to. He could not provide this kind of individual instruction when he previously served as a graduate assistant in the program. Colloton is serving as an interim assistant coach this season for the women’s basketball team. Although it’s in an interim role, he is living his dream of being a college coach. It was a dream job that he did not expect to come so soon. “The ball stops bouncing for everybody, and for me I wish it would’ve bounced a little bit longer than it did,” he said. Colloton spent his undergraduate career at Wittenberg University, the winningest men’s program in Division III . He was a member of the basketball team as a freshman, though being part of the team did not last as long as he thought it would. Most students found out about the cuts through an email with a list of names, he said. His coach, Bill Brown, sent him an email directly to explain the situation.“Coach Brown actually sent me a personalized email that said, ‘Jimmy, we just don’t have room in the program for you this year,’” Colloton said. “‘We really think that you would do a good job as an assistant coach, would you like to do it?’”Colloton had dreams of becoming a coach, so he accepted his coach’s offer and became a student coach for the men’s basketball program that he once belonged to as a player. He was a student coach for the program from 2007 until 2011, the year he graduated from Wittenberg. After graduation, Colloton enrolled at IU to pursue a master of science in sports management. Originally hired by former coach Felisha Legette-Jack as a graduate assistant, Colloton was brought over by IU Coach Curt Miller after Legette-Jack was fired.Colloton was approached about the interim assistant coach position by Miller after former assistant coach Chris Day left to become an assistant at the University of Pennsylvania. “Two weeks later, he talked to me after Chris left and asked me if I wanted to take the opportunity, and the rest is history,” Colloton said. Colloton said being a graduate assistant allowed him to mainly stand and observe as well as give advice in meetings, but it didn’t really allow him to coach kids one-on-one on the court. “Being able to coach the kids on the court is just an incredible opportunity for me and an absolute dream come true,” he said. “Besides coaching the kids, having input about gameplans and scouting reports has just been incredible.” Colloton said coaching the players and being able to teach them has been his favorite part of the experience. “My dad is a high school girls’ basketball coach in Chicago, and I’ve been going to practices since I was 5 or 6-years-old,” he said. “Being able to actually instruct the kids and coach them and being able to have my voice heard in practice and film sessions has been awesome.”Sophomore forward Kaila Hulls said Colloton contributes a lot in practice and is good at what he does. “He’s really stepped up,” she said. “I think he realizes the time commitment and the hard work that it takes to coach at this level.”Miller said he is pleased with Colloton’s ability to teach the game. “He’s gonna be a superstar in this profession,” Miller said. “You will all hear about Jimmy Colloton somewhere down the line.”Follow reporter Stuart Jackson on Twitter @Stuart_Jackson1.
(11/13/13 5:04am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>The first road game of the season proved to be a challenging one for the Hoosiers, but IU escaped with an 85-80 victory over the Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne Mastadons. “Big win tonight against a very talented and veteran team,” IU Coach Curt Miller said.The Mastodons had no answer for IU senior center Sasha Chaplin Monday night. Chaplin finished one point shy of tying her career high, scoring 21 points in addition to grabbing seven rebounds. “I could’ve played her even longer, but we made some defensive adjustments at the end of the game,” Miller said. “But offensively she was huge inside.”After earning Big Ten Co-Freshman of the Week honors, Larryn Brooks continued her strong play. She finished with a career-high 25 points while dishing out six assists and grabbing four rebounds. Brooks got to the free throw line often, going 13-15.“Larryn Brooks took over the game in stretches for us,” Miller said. Taylor Agler got the Hoosiers going early, contributing 11 points and seven rebounds one assist in the first seven minutes. With 7:07 remaining in the first half, the Hoosiers’ lead was cut to 3 after being up by as many as 13 points. The Mastodons went on a 8-2 run to close the gap. The Hoosiers never trailed in the game, but IPFW cut the deficit to two points with 36 seconds remaining in the game. “We got to the foul line and held off a late run by IPFW,” Miller said. IU shot 44.1 percent (15-34) in the first half. IPFW shot 46.7 percent (14-30) in the first half, but the Hoosiers held the Mastodons to 1-8 shooting from the perimeter. Miller said there were a lot of first-year players playing in crunch time. “Everybody was making plays, getting to the foul line,” he said. For the second consecutive game, the Hoosiers improved their field goal percentage in the second half. They shot 55 percent in the second half and 48 percent for the game. IPFW senior guard Amanda Hyde picked up two fouls early in the first half but remained on the floor. She led all scorers with 33 points on 60 percent (9-15) shooting from the field. “Defensively, tough challenge tonight against a bunch of guards that can really penetrate you,” Miller said. IU found the free throw line often, earning 29 points from the charity stripe. The Mastadons were perfect from the freethrow line, shooting 24-24. “IPFW shot the ball tremendously from the foul line,” Miller said. “24 of 24 kept them in it.”IU will be on the road again this Friday for its next game, when it takes on Indiana State at 7:05 p.m. in Terre Haute.Follow women's basketball reporter Stuart Jackson on Twitter @Stuart_Jackson1.
(11/11/13 4:46am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>The IU women’s basketball team found itself in the record books after Saturday’s 85-55 victory against Oakland at Assembly Hall in the team’s season-opener.The Hoosiers’ 85 points are the most points the team has scored in a season opener since the 2002-2003 season, when it scored 90 points against Wofford.Freshman guard Larryn Brooks scored 19 points in her first regular season game.“I’m feeling pretty good about it,” Brooks said. “Main goals right now are just playing my role and just doing what I can for the team.”Senior forward Tabitha Gerardot contributed 14 points on 5-for-11 shooting from the field. She also went 2-for-4 from 3-point range.Senior Sasha Chaplin scored the team’s first six points at the start.“Sasha really got us going,” Gerardot said. “She had a really powerful start.”Redshirt sophomore Kaila Hulls, also playing in her first regular season college game, finished with nine points, seven rebounds and three assists in 27 minutes.Four of the IU’s five starters — Brooks, Gerardot, Hulls and freshman Taylor Agler — are in their first season playing with the Hoosiers.Seven first-year players saw playing time for the Hoosiers (1-0).After accounting for 62 of the team’s 79 points in their exhibition win over Kentucky, they finished with 62 of the team’s 85 points.IU shot 48 percent (18-37) from the field in the first half, and 50 percent (15-30) in the second half. The team’s 48 first-half points were the most ever in a half under IU Coach Curt Miller. “For a young team it was a little boost of confidence that we came out and executed in the first half and got the game up tempo,” he said. IU shot 49.3 percent, its best field-goal percentage since Nov. 26, 2012.Follow women’s baskeball reporter Stuart Jackson on Twitter @Stuart_Jackson1.
(10/30/13 3:05am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>It was an unusual start to the season with four first-year players starting and a technical foul call before the tip, but Indiana still opened its 2013-14 season with a 79-55 exhibition victory over Georgetown College (Kentucky). Sophomore Kaila Hulls scored 13 points and added 12 rebounds in her first college game to lead IU. It was her first competitive game in two and a half years.“It’s really surreal to even talk about,” Hulls said. “It felt good to be out there.” IU Coach Curt Miller said 2011 seems like a long time ago when considering the last time Hulls was in a competitive game.“Really proud of her perseverance and hard work that she’s put in to be at this point,” Miller said. “Really happy for her.”The Hoosiers shot 29-82 (35.4 percent) from the field as a team.Miller chose to start four first-year players, who ended up having a big impact on the game.Freshman, redshirts and transfers scored 62 of the team’s 79 points.“I was really pleased,” he said. “A significant percentage of points came from our first-year players. It bodes well.”Freshman Taylor Agler contributed 10 points and nine assists in her first game as a Hoosier. “It was a whole team effort on that and I just went out there with a lot of energy because it was my first college game ever,” she said.Freshman Larryn Brooks also added 13 points.The Hoosiers shot the ball poorly in the second half despite increasing their lead. After shooting 40.5% in the first half, the team shot 30% in the second half.“We did not shoot the ball overall well against their matchup zone,” Miller said. “We were not fully prepared to attack that in a variety of ways.”Despite the poor shooting, he was encouraged by the team’s rebounding.“We did compete on the boards,” Miller said. “In the second half, we had 18 offensive rebounds when we weren’t shooting the ball well.”The technical foul that was called at the beginning of the game was because senior Tabitha Gerardot was not listed in the official book.Gerardot, a transfer from Valparaiso, scored eight points and added six rebounds.“I think that everybody has high hopes, and like we’ve said over and over again, we want to exceed expectations,” Gerardot said. Lizza Jones had 13 points for Georgetown College, which finished the game shooting 37.3 percent from the field. The Hoosiers will open up the regular season against Oakland at home on Nov. 9. Follow reporter Stuart Jackson on Twitter @Stuart_Jackson1.
(10/29/13 3:23am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>After playing against her teammates in practice during the last two months, graduate student center Sasha Chaplin is looking forward to a new challenge and seeing where her team stands. “We’ve been practicing for a while now,” she said. “So it will be finally good to go out there and play against someone other than ourselves.”The IU women’s basketball team’s season will tip off tonight at home in an exhibition against the Georgetown (Kentucky) Tigers.Despite being an exhibition game, IU Coach Curt Miller said the team is looking forward to playing an opponent that doesn’t know the team’s plays.“We cheat each other when we play against ourselves,” he said. “So it’s nice to play against someone who’s not going to know every counter and everything that we’re looking for.” Georgetown College, an NAIA school, finished 23-10 last season and lost to Lubbock Christian in the second round of the NAIA Division I Women’s Basketball Championship. “To be able to play a really good team like Georgetown that went deep into the NAIA National Championships last year and has four of their five starters back is a really good test out of the gate,” Miller said. “We’re playing against a very, very talented team.” IU sophomore forward Kaila Hulls will be playing in her first college game.Hulls, who transferred from Bowling Green last year, tore her ACL in her freshman year with the Falcons before the season started.Last year, after transferring to IU, she tore her ACL again during an August conditioning drill. “I’m kind of nervous, but I just gotta come out and do what I can,” Hulls said.Miller said Hulls has not played in a competitive game since high school in 2011.“It’s been pretty amazing that it’s that long,” Miller said. “All of her hard work has paid off to get back to this point. To do it in her hometown, in a place she dreamed of being ... we’re really excited for her.”The Hoosiers’ youth will also be on display for the first time in front of Hoosier Nation.IU has seven freshmen and 10 underclassmen total on its roster.“We do have nine players that will probably play that have never worn an Indiana uniform,” Miller said.Miller said he and his staff will try some things in the exhibition game that maybe they wouldn’t try in a regular season game.“It’s conceivable that we could start four kids that did not play last year in our program,” Miller said. “We want to win the game, but we are also going to play different combinations and try different people with each other.” This summer, Georgetown College picked up Teonia McCune, a 6-foot-5 transfer student from Wright State.Miller said he doesn’t expect McCune to be a big part of Georgetown’s game plan early.He is more concerned with their two All-Americans and veteran guards. “We match up better with a true low post like McCune, and so, when she’s in, I feel better that she’s a more traditional post (player),” Miller said.“I worry more about their undersized post because we’re not a great matchup for them.”Hulls said the game is going to be a wake up call for the team and that it will need to be fired up from the start.“They’re a veteran team, and we’re a very young team,” she said. “So that’s going to be our biggest challenge in matching their intensity.”Miller wants to see how hard the team competes tonight in addition to looking for combinations of players that gel and work together. “I want to get to the end of the game, regardless of how sloppy it is, how great execution is, not questioning that we played hard,” he said. Chaplin said the game will be a good test to let the nervousness go.“This game is huge for us,” Chaplin said. “Regardless of the outcome, we just want to come out and play Indiana basketball.”Follow reporter Stuart Jackson on Twitter @Stuart_Jackson1.
(10/07/13 3:51am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>IU Coach Curt Miller praised the IU women’s basketball team at Friday’s Hoosier Hysteria for its accomplishments behind the scenes last season. “We may not have won the Big Ten yet, but we’ve created an unbelievable chemistry in that locker room that continues now,” Miller said. “We became one of the hardest working teams in the Big Ten.”The Hoosiers’ recruiting class for this season ranks third in the Big Ten. Miller also had high praise for it. “When I look at this freshman class, I see a lot of Jordan Hulls and Christian Watfords in Coach Crean’s first recruiting class,” he said. “I look forward to seeing what those guys will be like in four years, what Jordan and Christian meant to the men’s program.”Other behind-the-scenes milestones from last season included a sizeable increase in attendance, Miller said. “We had a 20-percent increase in attendance per game in year one,” he said. “We look forward to that getting higher and higher as the years go,” he said. Miller pointed out that the team is one of the youngest in the Big Ten and the nation, but still has leadership. “We have 13 scholarship players eligible to play, but eight of them have yet to score a basket in an Indiana uniform,” he said. “But we do have five seniors on the team.” Miller also said fan support will be crucial this upcoming season. “There’s no doubt in my mind that the crowd will help us,” he said. “It’s not a coincidence that when we beat Purdue we had the best crowd of the year. When we had the best student body crowd of the year, we beat Purdue.” “It’s time for women’s basketball to be a player nationally,” Miller said. In the Hoosier Hysteria contests, redshirt sophomore Kaila Hulls was the top performer for the women’s team in the three-point shootout but fell to men’s finalist sophomore guard Kevin “Yogi” Ferrell in the finals. “I don’t like almost winning,” Hulls said. “I wish I would have won it. All the girls, we’re always in the gym shooting. And we had fun. That was the most important part about it.”Freshman forward Lyndsay Leikem won the two-ball competition, teaming up with men’s senior guard Taylor Wayer. “Shooting in front of all these people and competing with a men’s player, it was really awesome, and it felt great,” Leikem said. It was Leikem’s first time playing in front of the fans.“It was amazing,” she said. “It was everything I expected it to be — an amazing experience.”Hulls also said she predicts a successful upcoming season for the team. “Last year we did really well, and this year we have a really good incoming class, and even though we’re really young, I think we’re going to do really well,” she said. “We have high expectations for this team. I think we’re going to surprise a lot of people.”Follow reporter Stuart Jackson on Twitter @Stuart_Jackson1.
(10/02/13 2:38am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>The IU women’s basketball team will have up to eight games televised on the Big Ten Network this season. The games and times were announced by the conference Tuesday.“The Big Ten Network gives our program incredible exposure and will continue to help us build the new era of IU women’s basketball,” IU Coach Curt Miller said in a release. “We are excited about the announcement of the possibility to play as many as eight nationally televised games during the 2013-14 season. Other games will continue to be streamed live at BTN.com.”The first Big Ten Network appearance for the Hoosiers will be against Purdue at 7 p.m. Jan. 6 in West Lafayette. That same week, the Hoosiers’ home game against Ohio State at 4:30 p.m. Jan. 11 will also be aired on the Big Ten Network. The other games of the Hoosiers’ Big Ten schedule will be aired on the Big Ten Digital Network (BTDN), the conference’s online platform.The Hoosiers’ other Big Ten Network television games include Wisconsin on Feb. 8, at Nebraska on Feb. 16 and Illinois on Feb. 22.— Stuart Jackson
(09/17/13 3:39am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>It was the first day of football practice in fourth grade, and now-senior Conor Casey, playing the game for the first time, was trying on his new helmet and pads. Immediately, tears began flowing.“I get my shoulder pads. These are really stiff. I can’t move,” Casey said. “I put the helmet on. It was so suffocating to have that entire thing wrapped around my head, it just overwhelmed me. That first day of having to put on pads, God, I hated it.”He also tried teeball and cricket as a child, and soccer as a high school student athlete, but he said the sports never quite stuck with him. Then, he found rugby and has played for more than 10 years, making him the longest tenured player on the IU club rugby team. Casey was born in Arizona, but moved to Australia when he was young. His path to the sport was unorthodox compared to that of other players in that he went from rugby to football. Casey said he was a rugby player first, then went to football, then went back to rugby. He said many American rugby players come from football backgrounds.His most notable injury playing the game has been a broken nose. When he collided with another player, the athletic trainer came up with an unexpected solution.“Our athletic trainer was rummaging through his bag, looked at me and said, ‘Are you willing to do anything?’ I said, ‘Yes.’ He pulls out a tampon, cuts it in half and shoves it up,” Casey said. “Ten minutes later, I had a tampon shoved up my nose.” He said what drew him to rugby was its social aspect. “The culture of the game is very social,” he said. “After a match, we host the other team.”Teammates said Casey’s presence on the team has been valuable. Sophomore Matt Saunders said he knows this from his first year on the team last season. “As a freshman last year, not ever having any experience ever playing rugby, he was a good leader,” Saunders said. “He took me under his wing a little bit.” His coach, Sarasopa “Sopa” Enari, has also been very appreciative of Casey’s time on the team. “He’s a very coachable player,” Enari said. “He learned about the game before he came here, so that helped. He’s putting in the work.” Enari also said the players he expected to return and play Casey’s position did not come back. The experience has been very valuable for Casey’s position this season.“The other people I thought were going to be here to play the position he’s playing in, unfortunately they’re not here,” Enari said. “He’s stepping up and he’s coming along.”Throughout his collegiate career, Casey has returned to help coach his high school’s rugby team at Culver Military Academy in northern Indiana. That’s his ultimate goal, and Casey says his high school coach will eventually have him take over the program. “I’ve gotten certified as a coach, and I’m certified as a ref. I’m gonna go back every time once we get out of school, and I go up and I coach,” Casey said. “Once I’m done here, just gonna try to get a job up north, try (to) take over my old high school team and keep them running.”Follow reporter Stuart Jackson on Twitter @Stuart_Jackson1.
(09/11/13 3:23am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Late-season games in the IU women’s basketball team’s Big Ten schedule should prepare it well heading into the conference tournament. The Hoosiers’ final nine opponents had a combined Big Ten record of 78-66, a 0.542 winning percentage. The Hoosiers’ final opponent of the first half of conference play is Northwestern Jan. 30. Last season, the Wildcats had the top field goal percentage defense in the Big Ten, holding opponents to 35.3 percent shooting.IU begins the second half of conference play at Illinois Feb. 2. The Fighting Illini claimed the third-best team scoring average in the league at 68.9 points.However, the Fighting Illini struggled to shoot the ball well. It shot only 71.1 percent from the free throw line, 39.3 percent from the field and 29 percent from the 3-point line. Those percentages were ninth, 10th and 11th in the Big Ten respectively.Following Illinois will be IU’s second match-up against Wisconsin Feb. 8. The Badgers had the second-worst conference record last year, but boasted the best free throw shooting percentage at 0.770. Feb. 13 will also feature another second match-up of the season, this time against the defending conference champion Penn State. The Nittany Lions finished last season with the largest scoring margin, +14.6, and highest team scoring average, 73.6, in the Big Ten. IU will travel to Lincoln, Neb., Feb. 16 to face Nebraska for the first and only time in Big Ten play. The Cornhuskers had the second-best conference record at 12-4 and held opponents to 59 points per game last season.After facing the Cornhuskers, the Hoosiers return to Bloomington to take on Michigan Feb. 19. The Wolverines were terrific at defending the perimeter last season, holding opponents to 30.3 percent shooting from the 3-point line.Illinois travels to Bloomington for its second match-up of the season Feb. 22. IU will then face Minnesota for a second time Feb. 27. The Hoosiers will finish up Big Ten play against Michigan State in East Lansing, Mich., March 2. The Spartans were the best defensive team in the conference last season, finishing first in scoring defense, second in field goal percentage defense and first in 3-point field goal percentage defense. IU Coach Curt Miller and the Hoosiers will have their work cut out for them early in conference play, but a few repeat match-ups with opponents from earlier in the conference season will help them heading into the Big Ten tournament.Follow reporter Stuart Jackson on Twitter @Stuart_Jackson1.