College basketball recruiting is a process that often begins years in advance. Coaches usually need to start scouting and targeting potential recruits when they are underclassmen in high school.
When Margaret McKeon was hired as Boston University’s women’s basketball coach in August 1999, she turned her recruiting sights towards a highly-touted junior center at Eau Claire High School in Wisconsin named Larissa Parr.
A year-and-a-half later, Parr and fellow Wisconsin native Adrienne Norris teamed up to form the country’s 24th-ranked recruiting class. And while both of the freshmen have experienced their share of rookie growing pains, they have begun to emerge as the inside forces that McKeon expected them to be.
The arrival and development of Parr and Norris is one of the big reasons the Terriers, after winning only 23 games in the previous three seasons combined, are 13-8 on the season and only two wins away from being assured of their first winning season in seven years.
“They’re two very good players,” McKeon said of her two freshmen. “That’s why the recruiting class was rated so highly. They know the game very well. They can shoot, they can handle the ball. Larissa was my number-one recruit when I got here, and we’re fortunate that both of them decided to come here.”
The two youngest Terriers carried the load for much of last night’s 76-65 home win over the University of Maine. While leading scorer Katie Terhune was held in check by the Black Bears’ physical zone defense, Parr and Norris exploited mismatches in the paint.
Parr scored 10-of-16 points in the second half and pulled down eight rebounds. Meanwhile, Norris scored a team-high 17 points, pulled down a game-high 12 rebounds and made all five of her free throws. Parr and Norris combined to shoot 12-of-23 from the field, while the rest of the Terriers were only 13-of-32 (40.6 percent).
“I was told that [Maine] doubled the posts, so I practiced passing to the other guards,” Parr said of the first half. “I just missed some open shots. I got open looks, I just didn’t put them in.”
Parr’s shooting repertoire consisted of several baby-hook jumpers right in front of the basket and a couple of driving lay-ups. She didn’t venture outside much last night, but Parr showed that she could do so in Saturday’s loss to the University of Vermont when she drained a three-pointer from the left corner early in the second half.
“I told my staff that Adrienne and Larissa could each have 20 points,” McKeon said of the favorable matchups both players had inside. “They came close. Maine had major matchup problems against them.”
Over the last six games, Parr has averaged 12.3 points per game, has scored in double-figures the last three games and is leading the team in field goal percentage at .469. Similarly, Norris is averaging a team-high 6.9 rebounds per game. So it isn’t surprising that both freshmen have been in the starting lineup for the last several games, and the result has been more wins for the Terriers.
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