Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
NAIA WOMEN’S TOURNAMENT
SILOAM SPRINGS — As recently as her freshman year at North Arkansas College, Kodee Powell had no idea John Brown University even existed.
“I really didn’t,” she said. It wasn’t until during the 2013-14 season when JBU assistant women’s basketball coach Von Eshnaur showed up for a NorthArk basketball practice in Harrison that Powell discovered the Siloam Springs-based university.
“Coach Eshnaur actually came to watch one of our post players, Josie Harris,” Powell said.
NorthArk coach Stacie Klott told her team that Eshnaur was observing practice and it got Powell’s attention.
“I’m like, ‘OK, need to, you know, show my stuff,’” she said.
It wouldn’t be long after that when JBU officially discovered Powell, a 5-foot-4 point guard from Green Forest who sort of slipped through the cracks in recruiting, said coach Jeff Soderquist.
“We had heard of her, but I think it was under the radar a little bit,” he said.
Soderquist also pointed out that at the time of Powell’s recruitment out of high school, JBU was fully stocked with point guards in Eliana Fernandez and Lauren Rogers.
But with Fernandez and Rogers both graduating after the 2014-15 season, Soderquist was in need of a floor general and Powell fit the bill after two strong seasons at NorthArk.
“I think we got wind of her during her freshman year (at NorthArk) and then more her sophomore year,” Soderquist said. “We got a lot of video and then watched her play in person.
“I saw her play one time and I thought she could fit in to what we do.”
The rest is history for Powell and JBU.
Soderquist offered Powell a scholarship, she accepted and over the last two seasons has played a key role in the Golden Eagles’ success on the basketball court.
“I think the one advantage of getting a junior college player is she was able to help us right away,” Soderquist said. “The disadvantage is you only get to have them for two years. I’d like to have her for two more.”
Powell was an All-Sooner Athletic Conference honorable mention selection as a junior, averaging 9.9 points and 4.1 assists as JBU went 18-14 overall.
This season — as the team’s only senior — Powell led JBU to a 22-8 overall record and 14-4 mark in league play. She and her teammates will take the floor together at least one more time today when the Golden Eagles open play in the NAIA Women’s Division I National Tournament in Billings, Mont. JBU is scheduled to play Benedictine (Kan.) at 6:15 p.m. Mountain Daylight Time (7:15 p.m. Central Time).
Powell is averaging 11.2 points and 4.0 assists and is JBU’s leader in minutes played at 31.2 per game.
She is also one of the top 3-point marksmen on one of the nation’s best 3-point shooting teams. She has hit 79 of 181 (43.6 percent) from behind the 3-point line, which ranks sixth in the nation.
As a team, JBU is second in the nation in 3-point percentage at 39.9 percent (323 of 809), trailing Shawnee State (Ohio), which has made 40.7 percent (256 of 629). JBU leads the nation with 323 3-pointers made and 10.77 made per game.
Powell led JBU in 3-point percentage until recently when her junior teammate — and roommate, ironically — Jana Schammel overtook her, hitting 48 of 108 3-pointers for 44.4 percent, which is fourth in the nation.
“She’s had a great year,” Schammel said of Powell, “and she’s been a really good leader for us. … She’s really stepped up in playing that role as the only senior and having all that responsibility all on her. I think she’s handled it great.”
Powell’s shooting success is more of a recent trend, she said.
Powell said her coach at Green Forest, Kyle Farrar, wasn’t a big fan of her shooting, and she said her role was to dribble and pass.
“At NorthArk and my summer teams would be like, ‘Why aren’t you shooting the ball?’” Powell said. “So then I started shooting.”
Powell said she’s learned a lot about herself in her time at JBU.
“I feel like I’ve grown as a person, and with God also,” she said. “I’ve had a strong faith, but it’s gotten stronger coming here.”
Playing basketball at JBU hasn’t been the only adjustment for Powell the last two years.
Another change has been learning how to live life away from her fraternal twin sister, Kaitlin Powell, who she played basketball with at Green Forest and for two years at NorthArk.
Kodee Powell said she and her sister had scholarship offers to keep playing basketball together after NorthArk, but her sister’s offers were only for half scholarships. Kaitlin decided she was ready to be done playing ball and wound up going to Arkansas Tech.
“We’re best friends. It was hard coming here and not having her,” Powell said. “I think we’ve grown closer because now we know we can live without each other. We didn’t think that was possible at first.”