Alumni in Europe in 2006-07

Bethany Donaphin is playing for Famila Basket Schio, in northern Italy east of Milan. This is Bethany's third season with Famila Schio. She played in Turkey and Italy in the prior two years. Nicole Powell is playing for Halcon Avenida in Salamanca, Spain. Nicole played in Turkey and Spain in the prior two years. Sebnem Kimyacioglu is playing for Besiktas in Istanbul. This is her second year with that team. One of her teammates is Sheri Sam, who you may remember from the ABL. Cori Enghusen is playing for Botas in Adana, a large city in southeastern Turkey nineteen miles from the Mediterranean coast. Cori played for a different Turkish team in the prior two years. Enjoli Izidor is playing for Migros in Istanbul. In prior years, she played for a different Turkish team and in Greece. Krista Rappahahn is playing for 08 Stockholm in Sweden. One of her teammates is Erin Grant, who graduated from Texas Tech last year.

Azzi Changed Our Way of Thinking About Women's Basketball

By: Ann Killion, Mercury News Can one naive teenager change the mindset of an entire region? You bet. Beginning 20 years ago, Jennifer Azzi changed the way the Bay Area thought about women's basketball. Azzi, who will be inducted into the San Jose Sports Hall of Fame tonight, turned the Bay Area into a hot spot. She helped change the way people thought about basketball. About women's team sports. Maybe even about women. "It always felt like it was about more than just basketball," said Azzi, 38. "Basketball was a vehicle to change perceptions about women." First came the coach. Tara VanDerveer arrived from Ohio State in 1985, ready to change things. But to do it, she needed a player. Not just any player, but a star to build around. "One person does make a difference," VanDerveer said. "What Jennifer brought was exactly what we needed." Her staff scoured the country and found Azzi. A hard-nosed, competitive, charismatic point guard who had the grades to get into Stanford and the desire to leave home. Which just happened to be in Tennessee -- one of the nation's true hotbeds for women's basketball. That Tennessee mindset was an important attribute that Azzi brought to Stanford. Fortunately for VanDerveer, Pat Summitt wasn't interested in Azzi. "They said they had an extra scholarship if I wanted it," Azzi said. "But I didn't feel like they wanted me to come there. And I never wanted to go there. I wanted a different experience." She wanted adventure and academics. And she just assumed that -- no matter where she went -- people would like to watch women's basketball. "We had 20,000 fans at our state tournament," she said. "I grew up in that atmosphere." The first time she got on an airplane was her recruiting trip to Stanford. The first time she set foot in California was that trip. She didn't have any second thoughts, no concerns about homesickness or adjustments. "I'm blessed sometimes with not being very realistic," Azzi said. "It didn't hit me until I got there, my first night in the dorm." That wasn't the only adjustment, when she arrived in 1986. When the team played, they didn't pull out the bleachers. No one came to the games. The team was terrible. "It was pretty depressing," she said. Azzi called her father and said she wanted to come home. He said he'd come and get her, but to get a good airfare he needed to purchase something a month in advance. Meantime, he wrote her every day. "By the time he came out, I was fine," she said. Except for the basketball part. One night after a loss, Azzi sat in darkened Maples Pavilion by herself, wondering what she'd committed herself to and despairing. Also sitting in the dark, having similar thoughts, was her coach. VanDerveer moved next to Azzi and told her, "Picture this place full. Picture us selling out by your senior year. Now picture us winning the national championship. Can you do that?" Azzi, still not very realistic, told her coach, "Sure." "I'd seen 10,000 fans at high school games," Azzi remembered. "Why not here? Why can't we make that happen?" Azzi helped make it happen. She and her teammates papered the dorms with fliers. She helped recruit other key players, such as Sonja Henning. Fans started to come. Victories started to pile up. "It was an obsession almost," she said. "We were so passionate about it." She made the Bay Area notice. She ran VanDerveer's up-tempo offense and embodied the coach's mantra of selling the sport every time she took the court. By Azzi's junior year, the team won the Pac-10 title and she was the league's player of the year. By her senior year, Maples was sold out. Azzi was the Naismith player of the year. And the team won the NCAA championship, in Azzi's home state. Azzi graduated in 1990. She was a member of the national-team pool and in 1995 was reunited with VanDerveer, who took a sabbatical from Stanford to coach the Olympic team. After the triumphant Atlanta Olympics -- where the team won the gold medal -- Azzi and a handful of other stars helped launch the American Basketball League. Azzi played for the Lasers at the Event Center at San Jose State. "That was my favorite 2 1/2 years of my career," she said. "I remember seeing people lined up around the Event Center on opening night. It was amazing what we had accomplished." But the ABL eventually folded because of stiff competition from the WNBA. Azzi played for the WNBA, in Detroit, Utah and San Antonio. She retired in 2004. Now she does public speaking and continues a relationship with the NBA. She's moving back to the Bay Area from Utah -- recently closing on a house in Mill Valley. She's sad that the excitement about women's sports that peaked in the late 1990s has died down. She's concerned that players don't realize they still have to sell the game. "I wonder if we've gotten a little bit lax," she said. "Each person has to earn their own respect." She'd love to see the Bay Area become home to a WNBA team, building around a local name such as -- for instance -- Candice Wiggins. For now, Azzi plans to catch some games as a fan at Maples, where the Cardinal will be putting together a run it hopes ends at the Final Four. Azzi can sit in the bleachers -- which will be pulled out and packed. And she can witness what she helped start two decades ago.

Paccione Concedes Loss, May Try Again

By: Charlie Brennan, Rocky Mountain News FORT COLLINS — Angie Paccione, who fought a spirited uphill battle in a district that has not elected a Democrat since 1970, acknowledged defeat shortly after noon today outside her campaign headquarters. The winner, Marilyn Musgrave, retained the Congressional seat with just over 7,000 votes. The loser offered a gracious speech and the victor remained out of public view today, long after Marilyn Musgrave was established as a narrow winner in Colorado's 4th Congressional District. Musgrave, who won by about 7,000 votes, had no plans to meet with reporters until Democratic challenger Angie Paccione acknowledged defeat, according to a Musgrave campaign spokesman. Paccione, who had fought a spirited uphill battle in a district that has not elected a Democrat since 1970, did so shortly after noon today outside her campaign headquarters. Paccione, who has served two terms in the state House representing Colorado's District 53, also said she will consider another bid for the seat Musgrave will now occupy for a third two-year term. "I think we have a great shot at it" in 2008, said Paccione, who spoke with a few dozen staff, volunteers and friends looking on. "I think the trend is certainly moving in the right direction." Musgrave won her seat by 13 percentage points in 2002, and 6 percentage points in 2004. It wasn't until about 4 a.m. today that she realized she wouldn't be the winner, Paccione said. "I went to bed about 5 a.m., and then I only tossed for a while" before getting back up to face a disappointing morning after. Paccione and Musgrave, and independent committees supporting them, spent about $8 million on the race. Paccione said the outcome might have been different, had the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee thrown money into her contest sooner. The DCCC did so only in the final days, with an anti-Musgrave ad for which they paid $500,000. "Next time around I would certainly try to have buy-in earlier, from the DCCC," said Paccione. Also, she credited the Republican Party's efficiency at encouraging early voters and promoting the use of absentee ballots. "We need to match that," Paccione said. Paccione's immediate plans are to take what she said would be her first vacation in several years, and then turn her attention to studying Tuesday's voting trends more closely, with an eye toward deciding on a second run for Musgrave's seat in 2008.

Debi Gore-Mann is a Bright Addition to USF Athletics

By: Janie McCauley, Associated Press SAN FRANCISCO - The main door to Debi Gore-Mann's office is usually open, and there's a comfy couch and a jar of candy on the desk. The University of San Francisco's energetic new athletic director has made this an inviting place, a rare bright spot in the basement of Memorial Gym. So far, Gore-Mann has been an equally bright addition to a school striving to get the Dons back on the national map the way they were when Bill Russell and K.C. Jones starred for the basketball team a half-century ago. "Really, the only long-term goal is winning, and winning with integrity," she said. "We want to be champions or near champions without tipping the field in our favor. College sports, it's so pure. Your career in some cases can hinge on a 19-year-old." USF hired Gore-Mann away from Stanford in July, making her the first female athletic director in school history and only the third ever in the West Coast Conference. She knows of only two other black women ADs in the country, though the NCAA doesn't track race. Gore-Mann loves it when athletes or coaches come by and plop down to take a load off or share what's on their mind. She even painted the walls white, covering up the aging wood paneling, and replaced a large conference table with the sofa. Anything to rid the room of potential barriers. "It was more like a lodge. I guess that door hasn't been open in like 20 years," she said. "The first day I was like, 'Boom' and I opened this door. For me, I've got to have an open-door policy." Everybody has noticed how approachable she is. Gore-Mann sees her coaches in the mailroom and invites them to stop by for an informal chat. She was all for her staff dressing up for Halloween and acknowledges that ideas sometimes come to mind while she's at home baking cookies. "At the end of the day, we work with 18- to 22-year-olds," she said. "We're not IBM. We deal with young people. We need to keep it fun." Once a staunch business woman, the 46-year-old Gore-Mann has an upbeat, outgoing personality and a refreshing blend of humility and competitive fire. She has been a sought-after executive in athletics almost from the first day she set foot on Stanford's campus again in 1999. She played basketball for the Cardinal from 1978-82. "She's very bright and extremely hardworking," said Ted Leland, the former Stanford athletic director now working at Pacific. "She has a passion for sports. I thought she really had leadership potential. She has a certain effervescence in her personality." Leland hired Gore-Mann, who has a master's degree in business administration from Stanford, away from Bechtel Enterprises, Inc., a premier engineering, construction and project management company. He'd heard about her from some alumni. "After the first 15 minutes, I thought it was a deal I had to make," he said. "She was an ex-athlete with an MBA and had worked on Wall Street." Gore-Mann served as senior associate athletic director and senior women's administrator at Stanford and the Cardinal won 14 Division-I national titles during her tenure. At USF, Gore-Mann replaced Bill Hogan, who left the Hilltop after 15 years to take the same position at Seattle University. The Dons are coming off the most successful spring sports season in school history, highlighted by the baseball team's first NCAA regional berth. "I will be transparent and honest," she said. "I have no secrets with my coaches." In the mid-1950s, San Francisco won consecutive NCAA titles basketball championships. The Dons have a talented men's team this season that is counting on improved camaraderie and staying healthy to make them a contender in the WCC, which has been dominated by Gonzaga for most of the last decade. Gore-Mann already had been commuting from Oakland to her alma mater, so now her drive is a shorter one. "We've got some new energy with our new athletic director," said first-year USF women's basketball coach Tanya Haave. "And she's a ballplayer, which is great." Gore-Mann's husband, Anthony, attended USF and played basketball for the Dons. The couple has a 10-year-old daughter, Quinci. Finding a school in an urban, diverse setting was paramount before Gore-Mann was going to leave Stanford. She became the second woman in recent years to leave Stanford for an athletic director job. Cheryl Levick accepted an AD job at Santa Clara before taking over at Saint Louis University. "I hope she does a good job," longtime Stanford women's basketball coach Tara VanDerveer said of Gore-Mann. "It does say something that two women left Stanford and became athletic directors." While Gore-Mann realizes she is definitely in the minority as a black woman running a college athletic department, she doesn't make an issue of it. Others, she says, paved the way. "It's still a small number," she said. "I don't think about it. I just do the job. I know there are women who have come before me and it wasn't like that, and I respect that completely. I don't want to make it seem like 'Gee, it's so easy.' They are the women who paid the dues so that it is easy, that people are respectful."

Rappahahn's Playing Days Aren't Over Yet

By Vickie Fulkerson, [Connecticut] Day Writer Krista Rappahahn wants to be a doctor — and she will be someday. For now, she still has the opportunity to be a basketball player. “Everybody I talked to was very positive and encouraging,” said Rappahahn, who graduated from Stanford University in the spring following a four-year career with the Cardinal women's basketball team. “This time last year, I didn't think this was necessarily possible.” Rappahahn, a former all-state selection at Norwich Free Academy and a native of Lebanon, will leave Sunday to play professionally in Sweden, making a six-month commitment to compete for Stockholm 08 of the Obol Basketball League. Rappahahn, a 6-foot guard, started 28 games for Stanford last season, averaging 8.9 points and 2.2 rebounds per game with 40 assists and 21 steals as the team went 26-8 overall and came one win from reaching the Final Four in Boston. She was named the winner of the Donald Kennedy Award, which is presented to the Stanford senior athlete who best exhibits the combination of excellent academics, strong athletic ability and a commitment to community service, and was a Pac-10 first-team All-Academic pick for the second straight season. Rappahahn finished as the runner-up at the ESPN College 3-Point Championship at the men's Final Four in Indianapolis. “I'm so excited,” said Rappahahn, 22, who hired an agent over the summer. “At the end of last year I was debating doing different things, going straight into medically related jobs. But you can only play basketball for so long, so I decided when an opportunity in Stockholm came up.” Rappahahn, who will leave for Stockholm from San Francisco, remained in California over the summer, she said in a telephone interview Wednesday, and was able to shadow doctors at the children's hospital at Stanford. She trained in Palo Alto, using the Stanford facilities and engaged in a few pickup games with her former teammates. As part of her contract in Sweden, Rappahahn said, she is set to coach a high school or middle school team there. Through a contact at Stanford who went to medical school in Sweden, she also hopes to be able to job-shadow doctors while in the country — and to learn Swedish. Rappahahn will be playing on the same team as former Texas Tech point guard Erin Grant. The Stockholm regular season begins Oct. 24 and the exhibition season has already begun, but because Rappahahn can only stay six months, she was forced to join the team already in progress. Rappahahn can't wait. “I have all these things I want to do, right? I'm trying to choose,” she said with a laugh. A human biology major who would like to become a pediatrician, Rappahahn scored 2,048 points to become NFA's all-time leading scorer, took the Wildcats to four straight state championship games, winning three, and finished with a career record of 106-2. She was named Connecticut's Gatorade Player of the Year as a senior in 2002.

Angie Paccione Played Like a Guy

By:Keith Goldberg, [New York] Times Herald-Record
August 8, 2006

The biggest compliment Angie Paccione ever got on a basketball court came in the fifth grade. Paccione was playing a CYO Christmas tournament at St. Joseph's Church in New Windsor. She was just named the tournament MVP, when a man came down from the stands and walked over to her.

"You play like a guy," the man said.
"That opened my eyes," Paccione, now 46, recalls.

"My whole life is from my commitment to basketball," Paccione says. "I squeezed everything I could out of basketball." (More ...)

Note: Angie is running for the U. S. Congress. You can find news of her campaign at Angie's Congressional Campaign site.

10th Anniversary of USA Basketball's Olympic Gold

From: USA Basketball August 7, 2006 When an athlete is presented with the rare opportunity to help change the perception of the sport they play, rarely will that opportunity be passed by. That was the opportunity 11 American women were given in 1995 to help change the perception of women's basketball in the United States. (More ...) By: Mechelle Voepel, ESPN.com August 8, 2006 ... And it was 10 years ago this summer that the U.S. national team proved that the money, effort, care and time invested in it was worthwhile, winning gold in the Atlanta Olympics before huge crowds. (More ...)

Krista Graduates with Many Honors

Krista Rappahahn graduated with these honors: Firestone Medal For Excellence in Undergraduate Research The Firestone award recognizes students undertaking honors projects in the social, physical, natural sciences, and engineering nominated by their academic programs or departments. The medalists each received an engraved bronze medal, citation, and check at an awards ceremony. Krista Rappahahn was awarded the Firestone medal for her research on the genetics of Hispanic cystic fibrosis patients. Donald Kennedy Award The Donald Kennedy Award is given to the senior athlete who best exhibits the contribution of excellent academics, strong athletic ability and a commitment to community service. J.E. Wallace Sterling Award The J.E. Wallace Sterling award, named after the former Stanford president, is granted by the Stanford Alumni Association to a graduating senior for his/her impact on Stanford through exemplary service and leadership. Krista Rappahahn received this award:

• for her selfless dedication to her classmates, exercised as sensitive mentor to the other student-athletes through Partners for Academic Excellence;
• for her unrivaled ability to reach beyond the Stanford "bubble" from rebuilding homes in East Palo Alto with Cardinal Life to counseling uninsured patients at the Arbor Free Clinic and helping kids cope at Camp Kesem;
• for her invaluable service to and belief in athletics at Stanford as a passionate member of the 2006 Athletic Director search committee, and a dedicated co-chair of Cardinal Council;
• for her captaincy of the women's basketball team, record-setting single season three-point shooting and affirmation that excellence in both athletics and academics can flourish exquisitely at Stanford;
• for her passion for life, boundless energy, relentless commitment and unselfish contribution to her Stanford community and beyond, all informed by her belief that fulfillment comes from service to others.

Batastini Has Found Her Niche

By: Carolyn Thornton, Providence Journal Sports Writer
May 7, 2006

Basketball has taken Christina Batastini all over the world.

It took the former Classical All-American and New England Basketball Hall of Famer to the West Coast, where she played for Stanford, a top university with one of the country's best Division I programs.

Basketball also took her overseas, where she visited nearly a dozen countries and learned two new languages while playing professionally for four years against some of the best players in Europe.

And now, basketball has brought Batastini, 28, back to Rhode Island, where for the past 10 months, the Providence resident has been helping other young people build a solid basketball foundation, which just might help them create their own exciting opportunities.

"I'm doing this because I enjoy it and there's a need for it," said Batastini, who has created The Batastini School of Basketball.

Basketball was not the only area of excellence for Batastini, who was the 1996 Providence Journal Honor Roll Girl. She also earned All-State honors in cross country and track, and was named to both the Nike and Parade All-America basketball teams.

Even while she was playing pro ball in Italy, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland, Batastini had begun to realize how much she enjoyed working with young players through various basketball clinics she conducted in Europe.

Although she enjoyed serving as an assistant to Brown women's basketball coach Jean Marie Burr for the 2004-05 season after deciding it was time to bring her professional career to a close, it was becoming clearer to Batastini that she was meant to utilize her talents on the court in a different way.

Those talents and the direction she's taking them can be traced to being a 5-year-old sitting on the bench beside her father, Armand, watching him coach the St. Pius CYO teams. Batastini has seen the lasting impact her father has had on generations of players, and now she would like to do the same.

She began working with two sixth-grade boys who played for her father's team and were looking for some help on their games in the summer.

Then the phone started ringing as word got out that Batastini was providing individual instruction. In no time, she was working with 30 kids.

Last fall, she began conducting camps and clinics at various gymnasiums in Providence. Batastini is now also working with a number of Rhode Island College players and has been commissioned by Providence College coach Phil Seymore to work with some of the Lady Friars over the summer.

"It's just enjoyable working with the kids," she said. "It's fun to see the big difference I can make. I feel like I'm really helping them. My only goal is to make them better. I've embraced the idea that I can help a lot of players get to where they want to go."

Although she does work with boys, Batastini's client base has been primarily girls. And that's fine with her.

"I think that's going to be my niche," said Batastini, who feels strongly about including current and former Rhode Island female players on her staff to serve as role models. "I think it's important for the girls to be able to see someone like me or someone like Chelsea Marandola, [the Johnston All-Stater who just finished her rookie season at PC]. They need to be able to see females from Rhode Island who have gone on to be successful in college."

Batastini says that the one-on-one instruction she provides is something that most coaches simply don't have the luxury of doing when they are trying to manage a team of 10 to 12 kids.

She is amazed at how many youngsters lack the proper fundamentals, attributing some of the bad habits kids develop to shooting with "the wrong size ball at the wrong size hoop at a young age" and mimicking what they see the pros doing on television.

When working with a player, Batastini doesn't give them the ball until they have mastered a particular drill without it, and she won't let them shoot at a hoop until they have perfected their form.

"We go over and over it, and until someone can do something little, I don't introduce them to something more complicated," she said. "In order to move up, you have to have strong fundamentals."

Seeing some of her former Stanford teammates and classmates working on Wall Street, running start-up companies in California and becoming executives in the NBA, Batastini sometimes questions the career path she has chosen, wondering if she should be better utilizing her degree in American Studies. But ultimately, she comes to the realization that this is exactly what she should be doing with her life right now.

"Sometimes I ask myself, 'What am I doing?' " Batastini said. "But in the end, I wouldn't be happy without having basketball in my life. I always knew I would be doing something with athletics. It's just a part of me. I can't separate the two."

Steding Melds Faith, Action

By: Kerry Eggers, Portland Sports Tribune
February 10, 2006

Maybe it’s not her calling in life. At 38, there still may be a lot of twists and turns in her career. But there is little doubt that, for the time being, coaching the women’s basketball team at Warner Pacific College is the right move for Katy Steding. (More ...)

Stanford Women's Basketball Then and Now

By: Marian Burton Nelson

The phone rang. It was Fred Hargadon, Dean of Admissions. It was April 1974 and I had not yet accepted Stanford’s invitation to attend. I was an athlete, having played five different sports in high school and having led the Phoenix Dusters, a women’s amateur basketball team, to the Arizona State Championship. Though I had always wanted to go to Stanford, Cornell offered a much better athletic program for women in those days, so I was taking my time making up my mind. (More ...)

Whiting Honored for Great Career

By: Kevin Tresolini, Delaware News Journal January 12, 2006 When she left for Stanford University in 1989, Val Whiting was just 17 and not sure she was ready. It wasn't the cross-country move that most worried the Wilmington resident, but the physical demands of being a Division I college basketball player. "I remember like it was yesterday," Whiting said Wednesday. "I was scared out of my mind. They had given us these workouts to do during the summer, and I hadn't followed them. I thought I could play basketball every day to get ready, and that was my rude awakening. I remember going through that first two-mile [running] test and being lapped." Whiting got through that transition. She was named national freshman of the year while helping Stanford win an NCAA title. The 6-foot-2 center went on to become a two-time All-American, win another NCAA crown as a junior, and set school scoring and rebounding records. Recognition of that career came Tuesday when Whiting, 33, learned she had been named to the NCAA women's basketball 25th anniversary team by an ESPN.com panel. She is one of 25 players. Stanford coach Tara VanDerveer said she was thrilled to learn Whiting had been selected. "This recognition is well deserved for Val," she said. "The one thing that I know about Val is that the bigger the game, the better she played." The NCAA sponsored its first women's basketball championship in 1982, and the team is part of a season-long anniversary celebration. It also includes players such as Old Dominion's Anne Donovan, Connecticut's Rebecca Lobo and Diana Taurasi, Southern Cal's Cheryl Miller, Virginia's Dawn Staley and Texas Tech's Sheryl Swoopes. Among those who didn't make the 25-player cut is USC's Lisa Leslie, whose national team heroics surpass her collegiate accomplishments. But it does include Whiting, who led Ursuline Academy to four Delaware high school titles. "I was very surprised and definitely flattered, when you look at the group of people with me and who they left out," Whiting said. "It's the whole history of the NCAA [which had taken over for the Association of Intercollegiate Athletics for Women]. "This is amazing. I just wish my kids [sons J.J., 5, and Victor, 1] were a little older so they could understand." The only other Stanford player selected was Jennifer Azzi, a guard who was a senior during Whiting's freshman year and inspired her greatly, she said. "A lot of the women on that list I used to watch when I was in high school and they inspired me," Whiting said. "They were pioneers. They made me not feel weird because I was a girl and athletic or muscular or tall." Stanford was 114-16 during Whiting's four years there, and she remembers them fondly. Her 2,077 points and 1,134 rebounds set school marks. They have since been eclipsed, but she still is second on both lists. Whiting averaged 15.6 points and 10.1 rebounds in 16 career NCAA tourney games. Stanford also reached the Final Four in Whiting's sophomore year. Prior to her freshman season, Whiting had no such grand vision while enduring 6 a.m. swimming pool workouts at Stanford. "We had to get in the pool in full sweats and tread water," she recalled. "After a while, you figure out what's going on. Our goal was to win a national championship, and that was part of the preparation. "I got lucky that first year when two post players announced they were leaving, so there were just three of us - two players and me off the bench. I knew I was going to play no matter what. It was a great opportunity." And Whiting made the most of it. "You never know where you're going to stand when you get into that type of competition," said Reggie Whiting, Val's father, who now lives in Redmond, Wash., with her mother, Claudette. "But when the team did well and she did well that first year, it really gave her a lot of confidence that took her further as a player. It was really a turning point for Val." VanDerveer expected great things, believing Whiting would be just what Stanford needed after an NCAA regional final loss to Louisiana Tech the year before Whiting's arrival. "As we were leaving the gym I was distraught and said to my assistant, 'How are we ever going to beat a team like this?' " VanDerveer remembered. "She said, 'Val is coming next year.' The rest is history." After graduating from Stanford, Whiting played professionally in Italy and Brazil and at home in the American Basketball League and WNBA, last suiting up for the Minnesota Lynx in 2002. She played for the United States in international competition, such as the Pan Am Games, and was the last player cut at the 1996 Olympic Trials. Along with husband Jay Raymond, Whiting now lives in Wilmington and operates Game Shape, an athletic performance training facility on A Street near the Riverfront. She frequently attends high school games, especially those involving Ursuline, which now has another player, 6-4 sophomore Elena DelleDonne, who has gained national acclaim. Whiting relishes seeing so many young girls in the stands looking up to the high school players. "I miss being out there playing, but an honor like this makes it all worthwhile," Whiting said. "It makes you realize how blessed you were to have great teammates and great coaches."