Alumnae Abroad: 2013-14 midseason report

This is how our Stanford alumnae are getting along in their professional basketball careers around the world. Some of the pro clubs have finished or almost finished their regular season; some are about halfway through.

Australia

Kayla Pedersen – Dandenong Rangers

The Australian professional basketball season has just three more weeks to go. The Rangers are having a very successful season. They stand second in their league with a 13-5 record.

Kayla grabs the most rebounds (8.6 per game), which ranks fourth in the league. She's the Rangers third-best scorer (12.2 points per game) and averages 1.5 assists, 0.8 steals and 0.7 blocks. She's had five double-doubles.

Asia

The professional basketball season is almost over in China — just three more games to go.

Jayne Appel – Liaoning Hengye (China)

Liaoning has had a poor season. It stands seventh in the league with a 9-9 record.

Jayne has been a great asset to the team. She leads (by a lot!) in scoring with 24.9 points per game (which is #6 in the league) and rebounding with 11.6 per game (#2 in the league). She also averages 1.8 assists, 1.8 steals (#10 in the league) and 1.5 blocks (#5 in the league) per game. She's scored in double digits in every game (more than 40 twice) and has had five double-doubles.

Nneka Ogwumike – Guangdong Dolphins (China)

Guangdong has had a fair season. It stands in a tie for fourth place in the league with a 12-7 record. With only three games left to play, it has virtually no chance of moving up into the top three.

Like Jayne, Nneka is also the far-out leader of her team in scoring with 28.5 points per game (which is #4 in the league) and rebounding with 9.0 per game (#8 in the league). She's made 66% of her shots, scored in double digits in every game, scored more than 30 points eight times, and had seven double-doubles. She also averages 2.0 assists, 2.4 steals (#2 in the league) and 0.6 blocks (#9 in the league) per game .

Europe

There are five weeks remaining in Round 1 of EuroLeague Women. The best 14 clubs (the top four or five from each of the three groups) will qualify for Round 2, which begins on March 11.

EuroCup Women has just completed the Eighth-Final ("Sweet 16") round. The quarter-finals begin in two weeks.

Joslyn Tinkle – Hat-Agro Uni Gyor (Hungary)

I've finally figured out how Hungarian professional women's basketball is organized. There are ten Division A teams. Five of them play each other in Middle European League. The other five (including Jos' team, Uni Gyor) play each other in Hungarian League. In Hungarian League, four of the teams are scheduled to play 14 games, but Uni Gyor began regular season play about two months later than them and is scheduled to play only eight games. I assume this is due to the bus crash in September in which Uni Gyor's manager and head coach died and several players were seriously injured.

Uni Gyor is having a mixed season. It has won all seven of its Hungarian League games (one more to go, next week) and is ranked #1 in Hungary Division A, but it has lost all six of its EuroLeague Women games. Courtney Vandersloot, Uni Gyor's best scorer, transferred to Italian team Familia Schio two weeks ago, which leaves Uni Gyor with little chance of advanding to Round 2.

Joslyn is a stellar member of the team. In Hungarian League games, she leads the team and Hungary Division A in scoring (21.1 points per game) and rebounding (12.7 per game). She also averages 2.1 assists, 2.6 steals and 0.6 blocks per game. She's taken the most free throws and made 94% of them.

In EuroLeague games, Joslyn leads Uni Gyor in rebounding (6.5 per game) and, since Vandersloot's transfer, in scoring (15.7 points per game). Her 3-point shooting has been outstanding. She's taken 60% of her shots from beyond the arc and made 48% of them, which is the best 3-point shooting percentage in EuroLeague.

Sarah Boothe – Widzew Lodz (Poland)

The Polish League regular season ended a couple of weeks ago. Widzew finished at ninth in the league with a 3-15 record.

Sarah averaged 5.7 points, 6.6 rebounds, 1.2 assists, 1.3 steals and 1.4 blocks per game.

Jillian Harmon – Lavezzini Parma (Italy)

With a third of the season left to play, Parma stands fifth in the Italian League with a 9-5 record.

Jillian is Parma's second-best scorer with 14.4 points per game, second-best rebounder with 9.3 per game (which ranks #7 in the league), and averages 1.4 assists and 1.9 steals per game. She's scored in double digits in all but two games and had six double-doubles.

Candice Wiggins – Maccabi Bnot Ashdod (Israel)

With two games left to play, Maccabi is tied for first place in the Israeli league with a 17-2 record.

Candice joined the team in the fifth round of the season. She has made the most 3-pointers (2.5 per game) and is Maccabi's third-best scorer with 16.1 points per game. She also averages 3.5 assists, 5.2 rebounds and 1.5 steals per game.

Kristen Newlin/Nevin Nevlin – Fenerbahce (Turkey)

With 10 of 26 rounds left to play, Fenerbahce stands second (to Galatasaray) in the Turkish league with a 14-2 record.

Fenerbahce is the only undefeated team left standing in EuroLeague Women. It stands alone at the top of Group B.

Kristin has played very little so far this season, and I don't know why. She's played in only four of the 14 Turkish League games and two of the seven EuroLeague games. There's been no report of her being injured, nor does it appear that she's being supplanted by other players — she already has a contract with Fenerbahce for 2014-15.

Sebnem Kimyacioglu – Galatasaray (Turkey)

Galatasaray stands at the top of the Turkish league with a 15-1 record. Its single loss was to Fenerbahce.

However, Galatasary won its fifth consecutive Turkish Cup by defeating Fenerbahce 76-70 in the final game. (Turkish Cup is a competition between the top eight Turkish League teams that takes place midway through the regular season.)

Turkish fans take their basketball seriously. From a report of the championship game, "To play out the final three seconds of the game, 20 minutes were needed to toss out all of the Fenerbahce fans who, with their team not standing a chance to win, started tossing stuff on the court."

Galatasarary is 6-2 in EuroLeague Women play and is tied for first place in Group C.

Seb is Galatasaray's 3-point specialist. She takes 60% of her shots from beyond the arc and makes 53% of them. She averages 4.8 points, 1.1 rebounds and 0.2 assists per game in Turkish League play. She averages 4.0 points, 1.6 rebounds and 0.3 assists per game in EuroLeague Women.

Cori Enghusen/Korel Engin – Tarsus Belediyesi (Turkey)

Tarsus stands 13th (of 14) in the Turkish league with a 3-13 record.

It went 3-3 in Eurocup Women and advanced to the eighth-finals, then lost its pair of games there, 63-72 & 85-87.

Cori is their best rebounder and shot blocker. She averages 6.8 rebounds, 1.2 blocks and 5.9 points per game in the Turkish league, and 6.6 rebounds, 1.1 blocks and 6.3 points in EuroCup Women.

Angela Taylor named Atlanta Dream General Manager

Angela Taylor (Stanford '93), a former executive with the Washington Mystics, Minnesota Lynx and WNBA, has been named executive vice president and general manager of the Atlanta Dream.

Taylor, the owner and president of NetWorks Sports Consulting, was Washington's general manager from 2009 to '10, and was vice president of business operations for Minnesota from 2006 to '08.

Fred Williams was relieved of his duties as coach and general manager and retained as a consultant after Atlanta was swept by Minnesota in last season's championship series. Michael Cooper was named the Dream's new coach on Nov. 21.

Taylor, a former player and assistant coach at Stanford, spent 10 years in the WNBA office, most recently as senior director of player personnel. She graduated from Stanford in 1993 after playing on two national championship teams.

Click here for the complete announcement.

Jayne & Nneka in USA Women's National Team Pool

Jayne and Nneka are members of the 33-player 2014-16 USA Basketball Women’s National Team pool, from which the 2014 USA World Championship Team and, if the U.S. qualifies, the 2016 U.S. Olympic Team will be selected.

Their comments about being selected were:

What would it mean for you to get another chance to play in the FIBA World Championship and what do you think you need to do to earn a spot on this year's team?
It would be a great honor to play in the FIBA World Championship along with some of the other tremendous candidates in the USA pool. To even be considered and have the opportunity to represent our country is awesome. In order to make the final roster, certain roles on the team need to be filled, whatever that may be for me in the eyes of the committee is what I will try to give. Coming out, playing hard, and enjoying this process is something I always look forward to with USA Basketball.

What does it mean for you to be included among the nation's best athletes under consideration for the 2014 USA World Championship Team?
I honestly can't express how proud I am of myself. It's always been a dream of mine to be considered for one of the higest accomplishments in basketball. After years of taking each developing step as a player, from high school to college basketball to the WNBA, it's refreshing and exciting to know that all the work can show for something remarkable.

Read more from USA Basketball...

Note that although the pool includes six college players, Chiney is noticeably absent. She did not attend the USA Basketball training camp last October in Las Vegas. At the time, she said she really wanted to focus on the upcoming season and her school work.

Catching up with Morgan

Sheri Baer (InMenlo) has written a nice story about how Morgan Clyburn (Stanford '09) balances coaching basketball at Menlo-Atherton High School and her career in bio-engineering:

M-A basketball coach Morgan Clyburn stays in the game while juggling career at medical device startup

Jayne's double-double lands her Player of the Week award.

Jayne had a great game last weekend for Liaoning — a double-double of 41 points and 21 rebounds — and received an Asia-basket.com Player of the Week award.

The WBCA (Women's Chinese Basketball Association) regular season is about half-over. Liaoning ranks in the middle with a 7-6 record. Jayne is the League's #6 scorer with 25.2 ppg, the #2 rebounder with 11.8 rpg and the #3 shot-blocker with 1.4 bpg.

Click here for the complete Eurobasket News report.

Jayne and Nneka got together just before Christmas when their teams played each other. Guangdong (Nneka's team) won that game 102-84. Jayne and Nneka were both the high scorers for their teams with 34 and 42 points respectively.