Colorado University Athletics
Brooks: Barry's '91-'92 Buffs Persevered, Excelled
February 16, 2012 | Women's Basketball, B.G. Brooks
Barry's roster that season featured one senior, two freshmen (both from Iowa, both having the initials of 'SS'), a small contingent of Coloradoans wildly eager to return to the NCAA Tournament after a two-year absence, a burgeoning sophomore forward whose parents would relocate from the Kansas City area to Colorado and decided to stay, and an assortment of role players who might have been viewed by outsiders with a shrug.
And that's how the season started for the 1991-92 Buffaloes. But blas+¬ beginnings don't necessarily mean average or worse finishes - and Barry's bunch from that season offers a compelling case study.
"That team had a lot of backbone; they went through more adversity than any team I ever coached," recalled Barry, who will be on hand Saturday at the Coors Events Center with at least five 1991-92 players to be honored at halftime of the CU-Utah game (5 p.m., ROOT Sports).
Continued Barry: "They were able to put issues behind them and focus on what the charge was. That was what was special. You need special leadership to do that and that was Debbie Jacobson, Amy Mathern, Mindy Henry, Abby Wirfs . . . they were pretty focused athletes."
That became obvious - at least to insiders - after an 8-8 beginning that included a five-game post-Christmas losing streak and an 0-3 Big Eight Conference start that Barry pinned on disconcerting and distracting "staffing issues." By mid-January, league observers had every reason to pencil in CU among the also-rans.
BUT A TURNAROUND WAS COMING, and after it happened the Buffs never looked back. Beginning with a 69-63 decision over Missouri in Boulder on Jan. 25, Barry's team launched a 14-game winning streak that propelled the Buffs through the Big Eight tournament. Barry was quick to tell her players that maybe the only way they would reach NCAA play was by winning the conference tourney - and by then they were on enough of a roll to respond.
They won their three games in Salina, Kan., by an average margin of 25.2 points, with that lopsided differential skewed by a 52-point win (79-27) against Kansas State in the tournament's first round. A 74-66 semifinal win over Nebraska sent CU into the title game against regular-season champion Kansas, and a 70-53 win against the No. 13 Jayhawks earned the Buffs their first Big Eight Tournament championship and the league's automatic NCAA Tournament bid.
But the wonderful run of 14 straight 'W's - Barry said her team simply "wanted to make up for lost time" - ended abruptly in the NCAA first round. And it ended, of all places, at home. No. 24 Southern Illinois paid a quick mid-March visit to the Events Center and left with an 84-80 overtime win.
CU's season was done at 22-9 (11-3 Big Eight), but it was a remarkable journey considering the team's makeup, how the season began and the foundation it would construct for seasons that followed.
"That team didn't have depth and that was its weakness," Barry said. "They had to play a certain way - play within themselves and not get into foul trouble. But there was not just a whole lot of depth. We were short on guards (Shelley Sheetz averaged 34 minutes as a freshman) . . . and that's probably why this team didn't go any further than it did. But it had enough toughness to be successful, and it totally laid the groundwork for the '93 team that went to the Elite Eight. Totally. It stuck in their craw that we lost to Southern Illinois. We should have won that game."
The 1991-92 team included three instate juniors. Barry said Mindy Henry (Merino), Sherrice King (Colorado Springs) and Amy Mathern (Lyons) wanted to follow the footsteps of Bridget Turner (Aurora) and Tracy Tripp (Fort Collins). The '87-'88 team had been to the NCAA Tournament, but there was no NCAA bid for the next two seasons, which Barry said grated on the homegrown trio of Henry, King and Mathern.
"They came in on the heels of the Bridget Turner, Tracy Tripp teams . . . they were recruited based on that success," Barry said. "I don't think they were going to be derailed on what their goals were for the '91-'92 season. When you're a freshman or a sophomore, you sometimes don't really know . . . but when you get to your junior and senior years, you do."
The '91-'92 Buffs featured a freshman (Sheetz at 14.1 points) and a sophomore (Jamillah Lang at 14.3) as the leading scorers. But the team's upperclassmen were mature enough "not to be jealous, envious . . . just very special leaders," Barry recalled.
AT THE TOP OF THAT LIST WAS THE team's lone senior, Debbie Jacobson, a coach's daughter from Wyoming (Evanston) who now is a team physician for the Colorado Mammoth. Barry called Jacobson "one of the best leaders I ever had" and Sheetz, now an assistant women's coach at the University of Denver, termed Jacobson "a great leader and mentor for our team, but especially for me that year, along with our assistant coach Barb Smith. That team had to persevere more than any other team I was a part of at CU."
Sheetz, who scored 1,775 career points (fifth all-time at CU), was roundly known more for her 'O' than her 'D.' "I was kind of in a scoring role . . . Ceal will say I hadn't played defense to this day," Sheetz said, adding that former assistant Barb Smith probably "had to watch the Dick Bennett defensive man-to-man video tape with me every week. Anyone who went through the program back in those days knows the Dick Bennett man-to-man defensive tape so well we could recite it - myself more than anyone."
Lang might have been a bit more efficient on the defensive end, but she also was a 1,000-point career scorer (1,596). Sheetz, CU's only Kodak All-America selection (1995), called the 6-0 Lang "a beast inside" and Barry said Lang "sometimes doesn't get her due . . . but she could score. She loved to shoot - and I say that in a positive way. She would get on the guards if they didn't get her the ball."
Lang recalled that she merely tried to be an opportunist: "When Ceal called on me, she didn't have to get my whole name out before I was off the bench and ready to check in. That season was a huge opportunity for me to jump in and do whatever I could to do to contribute. We had some tough-minded upperclassmen; Abby (Wirfs) was basically playing with a broken ankle. But I just always wanted to be on the court. I was ready to go."
A native of Kansas City who played five seasons professionally before returning to CU and earning her degree in 2005, Lang is married (Jamillah Lang Rehman) and has a 13-year-old daughter (Nana Asma'u). She now works as a victim's advocate for a non-profit organization in the Denver area and says the perseverance of the '91-'92 Buffs team as well as the mental discipline imposed by Barry left indelible marks that benefit and guide her now.
"There's a lot of adversity in my work - dealing with victims, trying to make people feel safe," Lang said. "It's challenging when I come home . . . I had four knee surgeries while I was playing and getting through that was difficult. Coach Barry taught us mental toughness and discipline. If you get into that mentality, it sticks with you."
Sheetz, one of two Iowans on the 1991-92 roster (she is from Cedar Rapids, redshirt Sheri Schmell was from Seymoure), learned similar lessons that have stayed with her through coaching stops at Washington State, San Diego, Pepperdine and now DU.
"This profession can test your integrity and character if your job's on the line," Sheetz said. "You check yourself every day because you know you can make a significant impact in lives. Do I look back and ask what would coach Barry do? Absolutely."
AFTER 13 YEARS AS AN ASSISTANT, Sheetz believes that is her calling. She has no aspirations, no illusions, about moving into a head coaching job. "No thank you," she said. "I enjoy doing things behind the scenes - the skill work with guards, the hands-on stuff. I'll let my boss (Erik Johnson) worry about the bigger picture and try to make sure he has nothing else to worry about. I love being an assistant, I love recruiting. I want to work behind the scenes. I'm doing what I love."
Sheetz will have to hustle on Saturday afternoon to make the 1991-92 team's 20th anniversary celebration of its Big Eight tournament championship. DU has a 1:30 p.m. home game against Louisiana-Monroe, but Sheetz wouldn't miss the festivities in Boulder.
"We were close, really a tight team," she said. "We played hard for each other and had to bring it every day."
Lang (Rehman) told of the trust level that developed on the '91-'92 team and remembered Jacobson, then an aspiring physician, sitting in on Lang's first knee surgery. Years later, when Lang needed another operation, she saw a local specialist who mentioned he had learned from one of the best - Jacobson.
Lang was stunned. She had no idea of what had become of Jacobson, but immediately contacted her and told her if another knee surgery was indeed necessary, she wanted her former teammate to do it. An insurance snafu prevented it.
"There's just that trust you have in teammates," Lang said. "That team had it. We stood up for each other. If anybody (on an opposing team) said anything to one of us, all of us reacted. (Saturday) will be like a family reunion, not like a team gathering. There has to be a closeness on championship teams - and we were close."
They were close enough to pull together and make something special of a season that couldn't have looked bleaker in late January. But by March, the bad days had given way to good times - and eventually, even better memories.
Contact: BG.Brooks@Colorado.EDU
