Colorado University Athletics
Brooks: Talented Swan Has An Answer For Settling In
November 01, 2012 | Women's Basketball, B.G. Brooks
"Chill."
Don't expect that dialogue to extend too far into the Colorado women's team 2012-13 season. Swan, a gifted 6-2 freshman from Tucson, Ariz., is a quick study. While she and her coaches believe getting up to speed on hoops at this level won't happen without effort, they do think it will happen fast.
"For a freshman, she's got a pretty complete game," said CU assistant Kelly Rae Finley, who coaches the Buffs' forwards. "She shoots the three, she can pull up, she can get to the basket. And she's got a good work ethic. She's mentally adjusting to the college game more than physically, because she's got all the physical tools."
And that's where we pick up "chill."
As Arizona's top women's prospect in 2012 and the nation's eighth-ranked forward, according to ESPN HoopGurlz, Swan arrived on the CU campus "pretty much right on target," said Buffs coach Linda Lappe.
But even most freshmen as highly skilled as Swan face a learning curve in the college game. At times during the first month of practice, said Lappe, Swan has "played in spurts. She'll 'hide' for a certain portion of practice, then do four or five great things in a row - get a great rebound, run the floor in transition offense or get a block. Four or five plays she can string together. With that, we know she can end up being a very good player, but nobody is considered a good player from having four good plays in a row then not being seen again. That's where she will get better when she's older and more mature."
Lappe has spoken with Swan and her fellow freshmen about the value of consistency, instructing them, said Swan, to use "key words on the court . . . if something goes wrong, it's a word you use to bring yourself back. Mine is 'chill.' I just say that to myself a couple of times, then I get back into it."
Swan was rarely out of it at Tucson's Marana High School. Coached by her mother, Diane, a walk-on for one season at Oklahoma who also helped for two years with the OU volleyball program, Swan averaged 20.8 points, 12.8 rebounds, 3.4 blocks and 3.0 steals in her senior season. But she didn't limit herself to basketball.
Asked Finley rhetorically: "Can you say 'super-athletic?' You'll hear that said a lot about her."
Swan earned a dozen varsity letters at Marana, competing in volleyball and track and field as well as basketball. In 2011, she was Arizona's Division II state champ in the shot put.
Lappe is still waiting to see Swan perform against some of the top-tier players on CU's non-conference schedule, then against those in the Pac-12 Conference. But based on what she's seen so far, Lappe said, "She has the potential to be as good as any athlete we've had here."
In what turned out to be a very pleasant irony, Finley first saw Swan play hoops when Swan was a member of the Arizona Elite club team in Phoenix. Finley, then an assistant at Harvard, was recruiting Christine Clark, also a member of the Arizona Elite. Diane Swan drove her daughter and Christine to Elite practices.
"It's kind of crazy," said Finley, who was hired by Lappe last spring. "Coming into this job, I probably knew more about Jamee than anybody else here."
Clark signed with Harvard, Swan with CU, and then Finley signs on with the Buffs as Swan's coach . . . welcome to the weird and intertwined world of college hoops.
Another oddity, one which undoubtedly worked in the Buffs' favor, was Swan's grandmother, Brenda Gorman, living in Dumont, a tiny mountain town tucked just off I-70 West that now has more than a Starbucks and a Breeze ski rental as its claims to fame.
"She's so excited for me to be here; she called me and said she's already got her season tickets," Swan said of 'Grandma Brennie.' "I've always been a little grandma's girl - until basketball started and I had to do other stuff, so my little brother took my spot. But now that I'm here, I'm taking that back.
"It's so good to have somebody like that close by, knowing that if anything happened somebody from my family could be here in a couple of hours. That was a big influence on me (coming to CU); I'm very family oriented."
Arizona and Oklahoma made strong pushes for Swan, but when she visited Boulder, "The family aspect of this school really got me," she said. "Everybody was together; it was like being home. On my official visit it was like I was at home hanging out with my brother or a bunch of friends and being able to fit in right away. Within like 20 minutes of meeting all the team, it just clicked."
That's happening on the court too, mainly because her fellow Buffs are helping Swan with her transition. "Her teammates have been great for her," Lappe said. "Freshmen can get overwhelmed with plays, terminology and all the new things they encounter . . . Chucky (Jeffery, senior guard) in particular has been very good at helping her, coaching her on the floor in a positive way so she doesn't get frustrated and can pick up on things faster."
Without her teammates coming to her aid, "I'd be really, really lost. And I'd probably be running a lot," Swan said with a laugh.
But Lappe also knows Swan isn't a run-of-the-mill first-year player and realizes that her "great feel for the game" necessitates an uncommon approach. Said Lappe: "Coaches have to make players like that not think too much. Obviously she has to know basics, the relevant information. But you don't want to bog her down with too much and watch her become 'paralyzed;' you just let her play. When you just let her let her play, she's pretty fast."
Swan termed her initial learning curve and recalling set plays "a little tough . . . I could write them down, but running them on the court is a little different. After a while it started to kick and everything is going smooth now." Her strength and conditioning will improve, and women's strength coach Chris Sheckler and his staff will make sure that happens.
Bonding with her teammates was done in a snap - like Swan said, probably after 20 minutes on her official visit - because she's got a never-met-a-stranger personality. "She has a real healthy sense of self," Finley said. "She's fun to be around and is easy going. Right now, she might be a little quieter than she really is. But in terms of 'coachability' - she's extremely coachable. She really wants people to be happy with her and she'll adjust to make that happen."
Swan's arrival gives CU three talented young front court players, the other two being 6-1 redshirt freshman Arielle Roberson and 6-2 sophomore Jen Reese. All three, said Lappe, performed well in a scrimmage last weekend against Northern Colorado: "They're all doing some good things. Jamee gives us a physical presence as either a 'four' or a 'five' and some athleticism as well."
She will get another look at that trio Friday night in an exhibition against Western State (7 p.m., CEC).
CU's regular-season opener is Sunday, Nov. 11 against Idaho (2 p.m., CEC), and Swan doesn't believe that afternoon can arrive fast enough. "Even though we're together most of the time now, being on the road, being crazy together, then getting serious on the court . . . and the team dinners - those will be interesting," she said. "It'll be nice hanging out with everybody. I'm just so excited to be able to play and be with this team."
Lappe's expectations of Swan are high, maybe every bit as high as what Swan expects of herself. She will settle into the system and it all will become second nature. Until then Swan knows how to settle herself: Chill.
Contact: BG.Brooks@Colorado.EDU
