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Reemergence fits Vandy well

A return to national prominence has the school thinking big.

By SHARON GINN

© St. Petersburg Times,
published November 9, 2001

There was a time not too many years ago when Vanderbilt was one of the teams setting the pace for women's basketball in the Southeastern Conference.

But as Tennessee's Pat Summitt became the coach every girl with a jump shot dreamed of playing for, and as teams like Florida and Georgia rose to national prominence, Vanderbilt's program, steady yet mostly unspectacular, faded into the background.

The Commodores hit bottom in 1998-99, compiling the school's first losing record since the early 1980s and failing to reach the NCAA Tournament for the first time in 11 years.

But Vandy is back -- big time.

The Commodores, who tip off the season today in the preseason National Invitation Tournament, return every player from a squad that made the Elite Eight last season before losing to champion Notre Dame.

Led by junior center Chantelle Anderson, a preseason All-American and candidate for Naismith Player of the Year, Vanderbilt is ranked No. 3 in the Associated Press and ESPN/USA Today preseason polls, behind Connecticut and Tennessee. That's its best preseason ranking since 1993-94 when it was ranked No. 2 by AP, months after reaching the Final Four.

As always, the Volunteers are favorites. But this season Vanderbilt could make a serious run at not just winning the regular-season SEC title for the first time, but the national championship.

"All of a sudden we are the team that everybody wants to be," senior forward Zuzana Klimesova said. "It's going to be a great challenge. We just have to stand tall and take what's coming to us."

The newfound national respect for Vanderbilt emerged at last season's SEC tournament. Behind Anderson's 26 points, the Commodores upset Tennessee 77-74, a victory that snapped the Volunteers' winning streak against Vandy at 14.

The Commodores finished 24-10, the fourth-best victory total in school history.

The 6-foot-6 Anderson, a second-team All-American last season, is the key to building on that success. As a sophomore she averaged 21.2 points and 6.3 rebounds, and her 72.3 field-goal percentage was the best in the nation.

ESPN.com's Nancy Lieberman picked Anderson as her preseason player of the year, praising her shot blocking and shooting around the basket. Yet Anderson's field-goal percentage is likely to drop this season as she starts taking chances from the perimeter.

"My coaches have told me . . . I have to diversify my shots," Anderson said. "I have to become more of an outside threat."

The Commodores have other threats. Along with Anderson, Klimesova and Jenni Benningfeld round out one of the nation's top frontcourts. Together they averaged 46 points and 21 rebounds last season. Junior point guard Ashley McElhiney and senior shooting guard Jillian Danker made 44 percent of their 3-point attempts.

This season Vanderbilt won't be able to sneak up on anybody. But the Commodores say they won't miss being overlooked.

"If you look at the long history of Vanderbilt, we've had a lot of success in women's basketball," coach Jim Foster said. "We've had high expectations before, and we've dealt with them before. ... I don't think anything is different."

Said Anderson: "We have some very high goals. Potential means nothing unless you do something with it."

-- Times researcher John Martin contributed to this report.

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