Nylon Calculus: Notes from the AAC Media Day

It is easy to think of the American Athletic Conference as exclusively the domain of the Connecticut Huskies. After all, UConn hasn’t lost a league game in their three seasons atop the group, and at AAC Media Day this week, the Huskies were picked to finish first once again, while Uconn’s Kia Nurse was preseason player of the year and one of three Huskies on the league’s preseason first team.

But there are a number of extremely impressive players throughout the conference who bear watching for both the pleasure of today and their potential impact in the WNBA tomorrow.
Down in South Florida, the Bulls received the lone first-place vote that didn’t go to Connecticut. That happened in part because Geno Auriemma cannot vote for himself, but it also reflects the talent of sophomore forward Kitija Laksa, a 6-foot forward who will be central to the Bulls attack a year after graduating Courtney Williams to the WNBA.

“She’s not going to be able to control the expectations, the attention from the media,” USF head coach Jose Fernandez told Nylon Calculus Monday. “Because she’s one of the best perimeter players in the country, and she was only a freshman last year. What she can control is creating off the dribble, and improving her midrange game.”

Laksa has an absurdly quick release on her shot, while her 6-foot height makes it difficult for closeout defenders to bother her looks from the perimeter. Her 42 percent accuracy from three trailed only Breanna Stewart and Moriah Jefferson among last season’s AAC three-point shooters. It is her 36.9 percent mark from two that has to improve, and that’s been Laksa’s focus this fall after spending the summer back home in Latvia rehabbing an ankle injury.

“There might be some times with a mismatch, where we can post her up, back to the basket,” Fernandez said. “But I still think her strength is her shot, her quick release, or putting the ball down on the floor when a defender gets too close.”

While the three is Laksa’s ticket to elite scoring, it serves as the next great frontier for SMU’s versatile big, Alicia Froling. The Australian import didn’t hesitate to name fellow countrywoman Lauren Jackson as her long-term aspiration for her game, and that starts with moving outside the three-point line more this season.

“The WNBA’s always been a goal of mine,” Froling told Nylon Calculus Monday. “And I think it started with Lauren Jackson, a 6-foot-5 Australian. She can shoot, she can do everything. And growing up, my dad said, ‘You can’t just be a post. You have to come out. You have to do everything. So I think it’s always been a focus of mine to work on all my skills. And of course, now you see the Candace Parkers, the Delle Donnes, the Breanna Stewarts. They can do everything from that swing position. I know they’re the standard. It gives me a direction, a goal.”

Froling is the league’s top returning rebounder this season, with a rebound percentage of 13.5 percent, and showed a tantalizing glimpse of what her full potential looks like back on January 27 against Cincinnati. She scored 33 points, including shooting 2-for-4 from three, and grabbed a team record 22 rebounds in a 73-55 win.

“I feel like I should be able to play like that every night,” Froling said. “My teammates were finding me in the right spots. I was hitting shots. I’m very hard on myself, very negative, but that game really showed me what I could do.”

Her new coach, Travis Mays, believes she is headed to the next level as well. The former San Antonio Silver Stars assistant knows a little bit about great WNBA bigs, having coached Margo Dydek.

“Alicia has the potential to be, with her work ethic, a first rounder,” Mays said Monday. “It’s just about knowing what it takes to become a pro. And that’s not about how hard you work, because everyone in the WNBA works hard, and lots of people who don’t make the WNBA work hard. Now it’s about how efficient you are, how detailed you are. And it’s about what craft you master. If somebody’s going to pay money for your services, they need to know they can count on that particular thing every night. You can do that one particular thing great, and some other things good, that makes you even more versatile.”

An AAC player who already does something great — specifically, two things — is Tulane point guard Leslie Vorpahl. Last season, Vorpahl led the AAC in assist percentage, surpassing even second overall pick Moriah Jefferson. She did this while shooting 40.2 percent from three-point range, a combination of skills that should make her a highly sought after commodity in a league where plus point guards who can bury the three are in short supply.

“I think a lot of it is shot selection, not forcing up crazy shots,” Vorpahl said of her efficiency. “I think part of it is having great players around you to take the pressure off, because the defense can’t focus on one player.

“It’s awesome to think about the opportunity. I try to focus on the now. I obviously have goals and dreams. Becky Hammon was like my go-to growing up.”

At this, her coach, Lisa Stockton, jumped in and said, “You play like her.” (Consider this sentence a placeholder for where a comparison to Hammon’s Colorado State numbers would go, and simultaneously, a plea for more and better stats in the women’s game, particularly historic stats.)

“So I think there is opportunity,” Vorpahl continued. “But I think it has to be producing now, and then seeing what opportunities come.”

Between Vorpahl and returning leading scorer and backcourt mate Kolby Morgan, expect Tulane to contend for an NCAA tournament bid, a year after winning 21 and making a WNIT run.

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