Freshman Andersen leading Fairfield to top of MAAC

WOMEN’S BASKETBALL

FAIRFIELD — Meghan Andersen’s first choice to continue her academic and athletic careers in high school wasn’t Fairfield University or its women’s basketball team. She verbally committed to Fordham early in her junior year at Our Lady of Mercy Academy in Syosset, N.Y.

But a coaching change in the Bronx followed by some fast work by newly-hired Stags coach Carly ThibaultDuDonis had the 6-foot-1 forward giving Fairfield a second look.

“It’s kind of funny,” Andersen said. “Coach Carly was still in Minnesota when I took my visit here. I met her on FaceTime and two days later I committed here. She made it a point to be there somehow. It was just the way she communicated to me.

“I knew I loved the school though I hadn’t met the girls. But the way they explained how they saw me playing, the way they explained the team culture they wanted, I knew this

By David Borges

STORRS — For the past month, Donovan Clingan has been a near-model roommate, other than the occasional yelling over his performance in video games.

“He stayed competitive through the video games,” his roommate, Alex Karaban, reported. “I could tell if he won or lost.”

More importantly, Clingan staved off the sweet stuff. No Christmas cookies, as coach Dan Hurley had warned back on Dec. 23. As little calories as possible, especially since the foot injury that kept Clingan out of five straight UConn men’s basketball games prevented him from burning them very easily.

Hurley wanted the 7foot-2, 280-pound sophomore to shed some pounds. For one, it would allow Clingan to get back to the energetic, mobile freshman so key in

NO. 1 UCONN AT VILLANOVA Saturday, 8 p.m. (FS1)

UConn’s 2022-23 championship run. More importantly, it would take pressure off his feet, always a concern for big men.

Clingan took Hurley’s words seriously and dropped about 10 pounds.

“I realized ... it would be better for my feet, better for my body,” Clingan said Wednesday night, after making a triumphant return to the Huskies’ rotation. “I really locked into watching what I was eating, cutting down the calories. I wasn’t really active, so it’s hard to burn calories. So, I was focusing on what’s going to be best for me to help this team when I come back.”

There was no guarantee that Clingan, who suffered his injury in the second half of UConn’s loss at Seton Hall on Dec. 20, would return on Wednesday night. Hurley noted that “Cling Kong Watch” would be in full effect this week, but hinted it might be more likely Clingan returned on Saturday in Philadelphia against Villanova.

And so, Cling Kong Watch began in earnest two hours prior to Wednesday’s game against 18th-ranked Creighton. There was Clingan working out in warm-ups, looking pretty good. But he had done that three days earlier prior to the

was where I wanted to be.”

With the freshman’s precocious play, Andersen has helped the Stags get to where they want to be — in first place in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference.

Entering Saturday’s MAAC game at Marist, Fairfield (14-1, 6-0 MAAC) is the only unbeaten in conference play. Its 12-game winning streak since its loss at Vanderbilt on Nov. 12 is third-longest in the country to top-ranked South Carolina (16) and No. 2 Iowa (15). A week ago, it received votes in the Associated Press poll for the first time in program history.

Andersen leads the Stags and the MAAC in scoring (17.9) with a team-best 6.1 rebounds that is 10th in the conference. She ranks second in the MAAC in fieldgoal percentage (55.1) and is tied for fourth in 3-point percentage (41.7). Her 90.0 percent foul shooting would top the conference but she is two made free throws shy of qualifying for the lead. She is also second in the MAAC in blocked shots (1.5).

“Honestly, yeah,” Andersen said with a smile when asked if she was surprised with how her college career has started. “Coming in I didn’t know what was going to happen, how I was going to play and how much I was going to play. But I’m grateful to go out there on the court and be with these girls. I have a support system here that has helped me have more faith in myself and have more confidence.”

On Monday, Andersen was named the MAAC Rookie of the Week for the eighth time. She has also been named MAAC Player of the Week twice. She’s certainly a prohibitive favorite for Rookie of the Year honors in March and, if Fairfield can maintain its hold on first place, a strong Player of the Year candidate.

Thibault-DuDonis is not surprised.

“You never know how things are going to translate to freshmen,” Thibault-DuDonis said. “But Meg’s a special one. She is someone I watched play in AAU and honestly she was exactly what I wanted our forward players to play like. She can play on the perimeter, she can play inside, her length bothers people defensively, and she plays really hard.

“One of the things that is special about her is that she is as humble as you can get. She’s had so much success but yet hates the attention. It makes it so easy to root for her. That’s why her teammates want to give her the ball even more. The other thing is she does not get sped up by her opponent, whether they’re bigger, smaller, faster, denying her the ball, she just plays at her own pace.”

Thibault-DuDonis was an assistant on Lindsay Whalen’s coaching staff in Minnesota when Andersen committed to Fordham in October 2021. Ten weeks after she was hired to replace retiring Joe Frager at Fairfield in April 2022, Fordham fired coach Stephanie Gaitley, announcing the change in a terse three-sentence statement.

Andersen reopened her recruitment and ThibaultDuDonis reacted when she heard the news.

“Pretty quickly,” Thibault-DuDonis said with a smile. “I said to my staff in May, ‘This kid is committed to Fordham, but this is exactly the kind of player we wanted to recruit.’ Our staff was still getting to know each other and I used her as an example as the kind of player I wanted in that position. She became available with Fordham’s coaching change and I think my eyes popped out of my head.”

Two days later, on July 3, Anderson committed and she signed her letter of intent in November.

She arrived here in the summer from her home in Wantagh, N.Y., and got right to work.

“I think I’ve improved with my pace, staying poised in the post and not rushing shots,” Andersen said. “We have fantastic shooters on this team so being able to get them the ball (is important). In the summer, my footwork wasn’t the best and I was rushing shots. So I’ve been able to improve there. It was a big transition from playing pick-up, to playing four-on four, to playing five-on-five full court. It was a big adjustment but I could not have asked for a better support system than the one here to help me.”

She had 13 points in the season opener against Division III Lehman and followed up with 23 points, nine rebounds, and six blocked shots at Lipscomb. She recorded her first double-double with 22 points and 12 rebounds against Central Connecticut State in New Britain.

Her current run of nine straight double-figure scoring games started with 15 points against St. John’s on Dec. 7 and she followed that up with 18 points against her original selection Fordham three days later. On Jan. 4 at Niagara, she scored a season-high 30 points to become the first Fairfield rookie to do so. The performance helped her earn the Tamika Catchings Award from the United States Basketball Writers Association as the national Freshman of the Week. In the Stags’ latest win Saturday, 78-73 over Siena, she had 23 points.

“Meg’s just so poised,” Fairfield graduate student guard Izabela NicolettiLeite said. “Other freshmen that I’ve played with, or even when I was a freshman, you’re a little scared or a little hesitant or you think too much. Not Meg. She’s so poised and every time she steps on the court you know what you’re going to get from her. She knows what she can bring to this team. And I’ve never seen a more humble kid.”

Defenses have started to turn their focus to Andersen but it has not deterred her. Against Iona Jan. 7, she started slowly but never forced anything or rushed. Her teammates picked up the slack and she still finished with 10 points in a convincing win over the reigning MAAC tournament champions.

“That shows how hard we work,” Andersen said. “It can be anyone’s day, anyone’s night. That we’re always there for each other is important.”

All 14 of Fairfield’s remaining regular-season games are in the conference, including two against Quinnipiac, the only team with one MAAC loss. The Stags travel to Hamden on Jan. 25 with the Bobcats making the trip to Mahoney Arena here on Feb. 29.

Andersen’s best may be still to come with the more experience she gets.

“Meg’s grown a lot even in her short time here,” Thibault-DuDonis said. “She is someone who always wants to keep getting better. She’s always working on her game. But she also works on her mental game as well, as far as not getting rattled when her first two or three shots don’t go in and making sure she stays calm and in the moment. That’s a testament to doing what she has to do to continue to improve.”

The Stags refer to their forwards as “road runners” based on their speed and athleticism. Andersen has been the perfect fit in what they want to do.

But for all her individual accolades her main goal for the season hasn’t changed.

“I just want to keep winning,” Andersen said. “Whether I score 10 points, I score more, I don’t score at all, at the end of the night I just want to win.”

Perhaps that’s why in the MAAC this year so far she’s been second to none.