The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Auriemma welcoming prospect Poffenbarger
UConn’s Geno Auriemma has seen everything and done everything in 36 seasons on the job.
Well, almost everything. The idea of players leaving high school a few months early to get a head start on their college basketball career? Until recently, Auriemma had never heard of such a thing.
The Huskies added guard Saylor Poffenbarger to their roster Friday as an early enrollee. Poffenbarger, a four-star prospect in the Class of 2021 from Maryland, signed with the program in November and will be eligible to practice and play in games upon completion of a mandatory 10-day quarantine, which began Sunday.
The other three members of the class — consensus top recruit Azzi Fudd, Caroline Ducharme, and Amari DeBerry — plan to stay in high school.
“I’ve never done this before,” Auriemma said Monday on a Zoom call. “She’s never done this be
fore. When that time is over and she shows up to practice, that’s when the catching up will start.”
Poffenbarger is one of several Top 100 players across the country to make the jump early, an option that was presented to high school seniors in October when the NCAA granted all Division I athletes competing during the 2020-21 season an extra year of eligibility.
“The way it worked out was, if school’s over and the (high school) season’s been canceled and you think you want a change from where you are and you want to get acclimated, have a chance to play and practice, why not take advantage of it?” Auriemma said. “And you don’t lose any eligibility. Those are the conversations that have been going on, but certainly a lot of things had to fall into place.
“(Assistant coach) Shea (Ralph) spent a lot of time with all the logistics of it, and there was a lot of work done on this end as well to make sure we got all the protocols in place and getting registered for all of her courses.”
Poffenbarger averaged 21.2 points, 12.7 rebounds and 5.7 assists as a junior, despite a hip injury that required surgery. She was medically cleared in October, but had her senior season disrupted by COVID-19 and hasn’t played much since.
Because of that, Auriemma is setting the bar relatively low for the newest Husky.
“I don’t know where Saylor is at this point,” Auriemma said. “It’s not like she’s been working out every day with her team and playing in games and can just pick up where she left off. I think it’s going to be a little more difficult than that. For me, it’s just a wait and see, an opportunity to throw her in there and let her practice.
“Maybe she gets in a game, maybe she doesn’t. Maybe she contributes, maybe she doesn’t. I don’t know. I think all that remains to be seen. Being out on a court practicing, I think those are things that are beneficial.”
In the meantime, while in quarantine, Poffenbarger is taking online classes and doing a lot of waiting. She’s also being tested every day, according to Auriemma.
Regarded as a strong outside shooter, the 6-foot-2 guard out of Middletown (Md.) High School could potentially fill a need for UConn. The No. 3 Huskies (7-0) have connected on just 34.1 percent of their 3-point attempts, which ranks 69th in the country.
At the same time, the Huskies’ rotation is already eight or nine deep. Poffenbarger, one of seven freshmen, will be battling for minutes. The roster now stands at 12 players.
“We’re definitely going to do our best to help her get adjusted,” junior forward Olivia Nelson-Ododa said. “It’s difficult for anyone just to come in during the middle of the season. We’ve been at practice and workouts for a while now. We’re going to get her accustomed to how we do things.”
Auriemma was asked whether Poffenbarger’s mature enough to handle that adjustment.
“Yeah,” he said. “Am I positive, 100 percent? I don’t know. My guess is she’s going to handle it great.”
‘A VERY UNIQUE EXPERIENCE’
Dominique Darius, ESPN’s 26th-ranked prospect, enrolled early at UCLA in December, and has averaged 3.3 points in 10.3 minutes over three games. Ally VanTimmeren, the No. 95 prospect, is putting up 7.8 points and 5.0 rebounds a night with Boston College. Katie Borowicz, ranked 98th, has gotten into two contests with Minnesota (5.0 PPG).
Others are still waiting to debut.
“You’ve got people like Ally VanTimmeren at Boston College playing pretty significant minutes (23.8 per game) with pretty significant production. And then you’ve got a player like KN’isha Godfrey at Mississippi State who hasn’t seen the floor really,” said Shane Laflin, director of the Premier Basketball Report. “It’s a very unique experience for everybody.”
That said, how do recruiting experts see Poffenbarger adjusting?
“I think she’s going to go in with the mindset that she’s there to learn,” Laflin said, “and it’s an experience, not necessarily like people who get to campus and think they’re going to be on the floor right away. Obviously, Connecticut doesn’t lack for talent, so it’s not like she’s going to go in and leapfrog a bunch of people and then get on the floor by default because you’re just more talented. …
“Obviously, (Auriemma) wants to shoot from the perimeter better. Saylor definitely has range, but she’s not limited to that. Her versatility and her range, her ability to shoot 3s, does it make it a possibility to get on the floor? I’d think so.”