Cissy picked up a basketball at age 5 and hasn't put it down very often.
In an interview by Jim Armstrong (Denver Post), Cissy explains why she feels fulfilled now that she's playing basketball overseas.
Her mother says, "She's got her confidence and her swagger back. It's great to see the smile back on her face."
Nicole earned the Sacramento Bee's Female Athlete of the Year award because, "She always finds ways to improve."
Nicole will play for her third WNBA team next year.
Kate Starbird ('97), who is pursuing her doctorate in technology, media and society at the University of Colorado, has placed second in "Random Hacks of Kindness", a national technology competition held last month in Mountain View.
Her winning idea is based on Twitter, and Kate twitters that she is, "Reveling in [her] near victory ... without writing a single line of code!"
Read more in this report from the University of Colorado News Center.
The 2009-2010 season is well underway for women's professional basketball teams in Europe. Here is a report of the eight Stanford alumnae that are playing abroad this season.
Cissy Pierce ('08) is in Germany playing for Rhein-Main Baskets for the second season. She led her team to the Southern Germany League Championship last season.
This season they're currently 11th (of 12) in the league with a 2-7 record, but Cissy is having another excellent season. She is the second-best scorer in the league and the top scorer on her team. She averages 20.3 points per game, close to twice as many as anyone else. She also contributes 6.0 rebounds, 2.2 assists, 1.8 steals and 0.7 blocks per game.
Her name appears in almost every Rhein-Main Baskets game report, " ... led her team ... has long set the tone ... kept her team in the game ... makes every game well worth seeing ..."
Reports of their last five games are posted on the Rhein-Main Baskets website.
Candice Wiggins ('08) is in Greece, playing for Sony Athinaikos, which is #1 in their league with a 7-0 record. The team has also played three games in the EuroCup qualifying round and won two of them. They will play three more EuroCup games in December, after which the top two (of four) teams in each group will advance to the sixteenth-finals round.
Athinaikos does not post player statistics for the Greece League games. In the EuroCup games, Candice is in the starting five and plays almost 30 minutes a game. She is the team's leading scorer with 17.7 points per game. She is making 48.1% of her shots, 33.3% beyond the arc and 92.3% of her free throws.
(The photo of Candice is from last year when she was playing for Ros Casares. I could find no current photo of her.)
Jillian Harmon ('09) is playing in Italy for Comense in her first season of professional basketball. The team isn't doing very well. They're 11th of 12 in their league with two wins and six losses.
Jillian is doing well as a rookie. She has started a couple of games, but usually comes off the bench. She averages 10.9 points, 6.3 rebounds, and 1.5 steals per game.
Brooke Smith ('07) is playing for Comense for the second season. She is in the starting five and one of their top players. At 6'3", she's the tallest player on the team. She averages 15.4 points, 9.3 rebounds, one block and 3.3 steals per game. She has had two double-doubles.
She has the second most rebounds, fourth most blocks and ninth most points per game in the Italy A1 League
There are more photos of Brooke and Jillian in action on the Comense website.
Kristen Newlin ('07) is playing for Fenerbahce again this season. Fenerbahce was the champion of their Turkish league (TBBL) last season and also played in EuroLeague, where they made it to the quarterfinals.
They're playing in both leagues again this season and have made a strong start — #1 with a 5-0 record in the Turkish league and #3 in their EuroLeague group with a 3-2 record.
Kristen, who is known as Nevin Kristen Nevlin in Turkey, is a leading member of her team and one of the starting five. Her EuroLeague bio describes her as a very good mid-range shooter and a good rebounder in the low post. She averages 10.6 points, 3.4 rebounds and 60.0 FG% in the EuroLeague games and 12.4 points, 5.4 rebounds and 66.7 FG% in the Turkish League games. She scores from beyond the arc occasionally— one of seven in EuroLeague and two of two in TBBL.
Nicole Powell ('04) is also playing for Fenerbahce again this season. She played for them last season and in 2005-06.
She is in the starting five and described in her EuroLeague bio as one of the top outside shooters. In this season's EuroLeague games, she averages 16.6 points, 4.4 rebounds, 2.8 assists and 2.6 steals. She is making 45.7% of her field goals and 54.2% of her 3-pointers.
In the TBBL games, she averages 11.8 points, 4.2 rebounds, 2.0 assists and 1.0 steals. She is making 52.2% of her field goals and 50.0% of her 3-pointers.
Olympia Scott ('98) is playing for Mersin for the second season, her 11th of professional basketball.
Mersin is a member of the TBBL, the same Turkish League as Fenerbahce. They are #2 in the league with a 5-1 record. Their one loss was to Fenerbahce. In that game, Olympia was Mersin's top scorer with 17 points and five rebounds.
Olympia is now in her mid-thirties, and you might think that she'd be slowing down a bit on the basketball court — not so! She plays about 20 minutes a game. She is tied with Ivory Latta as Mersin's second-best scorer, shooting 53.3% for 12.6 points per game. She is also their #2 rebounder with 7.2 per game.
Cori Enghusen ('02) is also playing for Mersin this season. It's her sixth season of professional basketball, her fifth in Turkey, but her first with Mersin.
Cori, whose Turkish name is Korel Engin, comes off the bench for Mersin. She averages 3.1 points, 1.4 rebounds and 0.6 blocks per game.
T’Nae Thiel has been selected for induction to the 2009 class of the Weatherford High School Athletic Hall of Fame.
Read more in this report from the Weatherford Democrat.
Candice is one of 13 players selected to play in the 2009 Ekaterinburg International Invitational tournament as a member of the USA squad led by three members of the 2009-12 USA Basketball Women’s National Team.
Kristin Newlin (shown above with teammate Nicole Powell after winning the Turkish championship last season) is back in Istabul ready to start a brand new basketball year. She working hard to get back in shape and ready to play again.
Her summer away from basketball was jam packed with travel, friends and family. You can read all about that in this post to her blog.
The Los Angeles Sparks play their final regular-season home game tonight. It's Lisa Leslie's Farewell Game.
In a Los Angeles Times blog, Candice thanks Lisa for what she has done for her and for all women, women's sports and basketball. (Read more ... )
Pool Comense' 2009-2010 season began officially last week as the available players met with their new coach. Brooke and several other players have not arrived yet, but Jillian was there (upper row, second from right).
As you can see in this video that advertises NikeWomen's new line of training apparel.
The Manawatu Standard reported today that Jillian has withdrawn from the Tall Ferns squad that is preparing for the Oceania World Championship series.
She withdrew because Comense, the Italian club team she will play for this season, "insisted she arrive when requested".
In the mid-1970s, Kathy Levinson competed in three varsity sports at Stanford — basketball, tennis and field hockey. This was about ten years before Tara VanDerveer was hired as women's basketball head coach, and a couple of years after Title IX was passed.
Basketball New Zealand reports that Jillian is one of six Beijing Olympians who have joined a Tall Ferns training squad that is preparing for the FIBA Oceania Championship for Women later this month.
Making her first appearance as an All-Star, Nicole scored 21 points for the West, who defeated the East 130-118 in the 2009 WNBA All-Star game.
The Sacramento Monarchs today announced forward Nicole Powell will make her first All-Star appearance as selected by WNBA President Donna Orender. Powell will replace injured Los Angeles Sparks center Lisa Leslie as a reserve for the Western Conference.
Jillian will be playing professional basketball next season in Italy for Comense, the same team as Brooke.
Warren Grimes, devoted Cardinal fan, is having trouble letting go of Jillian. He writes:
As Summer wears on and we look to the Fall recruiting results and the forthcoming season, I’m having trouble letting go. The player involved – and you can guess – has to be one of the most tenacious, the most relentless, to ever wear the Stanford uniform. No, Jillian Harmon wasn’t the fastest, wasn’t the best shooter, wasn’t the best rebounder, wasn’t the best ball handler . . . but the truth is, she was damn good at all those things. Excellent in fact. Harmon was fast enough to steal the ball from an opposing guard and get down the court and score the lay up with consistent success. She did that against San Diego’s quick guards, and she did it again against Ohio State’s talented back court players. Those were spirit-breaking plays for Stanford opponents. Harmon was doing that sort of thing in virtually every game she played over the past four seasons, and she played in almost all of them.Here is a gallery of photos of Jillian throughout her Stanford career.
Last year, Harmon led the team in steals, had the third highest minutes per game, was third in assists, was 4th in blocks, 4th in rebounds, and 5th in points. She brought the ball up court many times, effectively serving as a relief point guard, yet she could play the power forward position when needed (that wasn’t needed much this last year). She was a very good defender, often drawing the opponent’s most prolific point scorer as her assignment. Is there anything Harmon couldn’t do? Well, she didn’t dunk, but no one else on the team did either. Her free throw shooting was not stellar, but even that improved to the point that the coaches wanted her in the game in the last minutes.
None of these stats really tell the story on Harmon. I’ll go back to my words relentless and tenacious. If you want to see how Harmon made a difference, think back to the semi-final victory over U Conn two years ago. Harmon was a defensive star that night, stealing the ball and getting some key rebounds. In this year’s tournament, she was a difference maker in the Ohio State game, which, in case you have forgotten, was a close game until the last two minutes. Harmon scored eight or so of the team’s points in the last two minutes to help make the game look like an easy win, but even more impressive were her steals and clutch shots when the game really was in the balance. Harmon was there all the time, giving her best, which was really very good indeed. Was there ever a game that you watched in which Harmon wasn’t giving her best? I don’t think so.
So I hope Jillian does well in Italy, in New Zealand, or wherever she ends up playing more basketball. Her fundamentals should make any team very glad to have her.
... Triple Threat Wiggins is a Knockout
Candice earned her first WNBA Player of the Week award by leading the Minnesota Lynx to two victories last week, which helped them reclaim a share of first place in the Western conference.
Naomi Mulitauaopele and her husband, Solomona Tagaleo'o ...
... have a beautiful baby boy named Solomona Atapana Tagaleo'o Jr.
Jennifer has posted a lot of photos and video clips in her blog that document her induction into the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame.
In spite of Kristin's game-high 20 points, Turkey lost to Belarus in the final game of the qualifying round of the 2009 EuroBasket Women tournament. Worse — they lost by more than seven points.
Here is a formal photo at the induction ceremony from the WBHOF:
Knoxville TV station WBIR summarizes the inductees' accompishments in this article. Accompanying the article is a video interview before the induction ceremony of Jennifer and her Oak Ridge High School basketball coach, Jill Prudden. This is a larger version of the video clip.
Ann Killion (San Jose Mercury) wrote this article about Jennifer that focussed on Jennifer's decision to attend Stanford and on how she and Tara brought each other success.
"Tara would have been successful without me at Stanford," Azzi said. "But I'm not sure of the reverse. I would have been pretty good, but it's unlikely that I would have truly reached my potential."
"Jennifer put Stanford basketball on the map," VanDerveer said. "She was the catalyst."
In another post to her blog, Jennifer reminisces about her freshman year at Stanford and her dad's Christmas gift to her that painful year.
The Turkish National team won two of its three games in the preliminary round of EuroBasket Women:
Kristen Newlin is in Latvia with the Turkish National team, competing in the EuroBasket Women tournament for the European championship.
Latvia is in far northern Europe, about the same latitude as Sitka, Alaska. Kristen tweets that the long daylight hours are messin' her.
Brooke's hard work and good performance at training camp paid off. She begins her second season with the Phoenix Mercury on Saturday.
Katy Steding, member of Stanford's stellar 1990 team and the 1996 gold medal U.S. Olympic team, has joined the Ivy League as assistant coach at Columbia University.
From the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune: Minnesota Lynx star guard Candice Wiggins scores off-court points as an advocate for youth AIDS education. Read more ...
Brooke was signed to a training camp contract by the Phoenix Mercury this season. The Mercury have played two preseason games — against the Sacramento Monarchs and the Seattle Storm.
Although Karen is not a Stanford alumna, she is a Stanford women's basketball alumna.
She was an assistant coach at Stanford for ten seasons before leaving in 2007 to take a job as assistant coach at Illinois.
She was announced today as the new Head Coach of Western Carolina University women's basketball.
Congratulations, Karen!
Jennifer Azzi, who was in Tara's first Stanford recruiting class in 1986, will be inducted into the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame next month. 
Kristen got the birthday present she was hoping for -- a gold medal! Her team, Fenerbahce, defeated Mersin 68-54 and won the Turkish Women's Basketball League championship today.
