By Fred J. Demarest
LSUsports.net
She didn’t get discouraged when she was selected 57th out of 64 athletes in the WNBA draft. Instead, she tried to prove everyone who passed her up wrong.
Selected in the fourth round by the Seattle Storm, former LSU women’s basketball standout Katrina Hibbert realized that she was going to an expansion team and would have an opportunity to compete for playing time immediately.
But even Hibbert couldn’t have possibly imagined that she would be in the starting lineup for the Storm’s first-ever game on May 31. Proving her skeptics wrong, Hibbert has gone on to start six of 11 games she has played in for the Storm this season.
“I certainly didn’t think that I would start the first game of the season,” says Hibbert, the sixth-leading scoring in LSU history with 1,695 points. “It’s been an adjustment because I could start one day and not play the next depending on the match-up, but I’m just trying to establish a role with this team.”
Hibbert has started the games in which the Storm has gone with a three-guard rotation and come off the bench when they go with a bigger lineup. She is averaging over 16 minutes per game, just over four points and is connecting on 32 percent of her three-pointers. Her best outing came on June 23 when she led the Storm in scoring with a 17-point outburst at Portland.
Coming from the Southeastern Conference, the Melbourne, Australia native has seen her fair share of talent. Still, the speed and tactical approach to the game is far different on the professional level.
“It’s tough to get used to the professional game because it is a much faster pace, plus it is more of a one-on-one and two-on-two game than in the college ranks,” says Hibbert.
The Storm has struggled as a team, another difficult adjustment for Hibbert. At LSU, Hibbert won more NCAA games and more SEC games than any other woman in school history. The Lady Tigers went to the Sweet 16 twice and the Elite Eight this past year in her final season. The Storm is off to a 2-13 start in its inaugural season.
“It’s a learning experience and something we will all grow from,” says Hibbert. “We knew we would take our bumps and bruises this season, but hopefully we’ll find the right chemistry, the right combinations and find something to build on this season.”
After the season’s conclusion in August, Hibbert will return to Baton Rouge and complete her degree in kinesiology at LSU. Despite the Olympics being in her native Australia in September, she is not a candidate this go around, but hasn’t ruled out Athens, Greece in 2004.