Stuff Digital Edition

Kiwi hoopster is a class act

Marc Hinton

harlisse Leger-Walker has had some basketball year already on the back off a freshman college campaign that had her coach dubbing her a WNBA player in waiting. But the Kiwi hoops phenom is not done yet turning buckets into special achievements in 2021.

Leger-Walker is lining up with the Tall Ferns, alongside her sister Krystal, at the Fiba Asia Cup in Jordan starting on Monday where eight teams will vie not only for the silverware, but, more importantly, the four spots to attend the final World Cup qualifying tournament in Sydney next February.

That will be a challenging task, with the Asia zone including recent Olympic silver medallists Japan, perennial global powerhouse Australia, a high-quality China outfit ranked No 7 in the world and an always competitive South Korea side who are also rated among the planet’s top 20.

The Ferns, ranked No 36 globally, have been drawn in Group A alongside Japan, Korea and India and their tournamentopening clash against the Koreans shapes as crucial for their hopes of making it into the top four and keeping the World Cup dream alive.

More than ever, the justturned 20-year-old Leger-Walker will be pivotal to the Ferns’ ambitions. The youngest New Zealand international, who first played for the national senior team as a 16-year-old, is fast maturing into a world-class shooting guard and will be expected to carry a hefty share of the scoring load in Jordan.

She looks more than up to that challenge on the back of what she achieved for Washington State University in the NCAA college season earlier this year, then the Waikato Wizards in an all-too-brief stint in the Kiwi women’s NBL, before it shut down due to Covid-19 restrictions.

Leger-Walker’s first season with the Cougars in the loaded Pac-12 conference was historically good, leading coach Kamie Ethridge to declare it was a matter of when, not if, she would become just the second New Zealand player to make it into the WNBA.

The first-year sensation led the team in scoring (18.8ppg) and steals (2.3spg) and was named Pac 12 Freshman of the Year and to the All-Pac-12 team as she led the power-packed conference in points scored (407) as well as steals.

She was on a similar sort of roll with the Waikato Wizards in the Kiwi NBL, averaging 26.3 points as they won their first three games convincingly before Covid reared its head.

Now she has come pretty much out of lockdown in New Zealand and on to the world basketball stage with the Ferns who, like so many, have had a

compromised buildup to an event with so much riding on it.

Leger-Walker shrugs off the fact that the team’s sole time together has been in Amman where they have had a 10-day camp to prepare for the event, and that coach Guy Molloy has been forced to select somewhat of a new generation squad, with a number of experienced Ferns unable to attend or now retired from the programme.

‘‘It’s tough,’’ Leger-Walker told Stuff from Jordan of a buildup like no other. ‘‘This is pretty much our first camp together in almost two years. We know as New Zealand that’s how it goes, and we’re kinda used to it. We have a new group, we’re fine-tuning a lot of things, and we don’t have a lot of time to get things right. But the progress we’ve made so far has been really positive.’’

In terms of the challenge to essentially nudge out Korea for a spot in the semifinals, LegerWalker says the under-sized Tall Ferns will not lack for belief. They defeated the Koreans most recently at the 2019 Olympic qualifiers in Auckland and the Asian side, who will have 10 of their 12-strong squad from the Tokyo Games in Jordan, will also be without WNBA star Ji-su Park.

‘‘We don’t have the size of other teams, but we’re used to that,’’ she said. ‘‘We’re looking to push the ball in transition, play an upbeat tempo, and we’re focusing on the defensive end and putting a lot of pressure on that way.’’

‘‘Our focus is totally on Korea at the moment. It’s about defending their off-ball movements. They set a lot of random screens in transition, so we’ve been focusing on defensive pressure and reads.

‘‘We’ve played them enough recently to know what they’re going to bring. It’s more about us, how we perform and how effectively we can come together.’’

What is a non-negotiable for the Ferns is their scrappiness. ‘‘That’s always part of our identity, grittiness and hustle plays, and it’s got to be a given,’’ added Leger-Walker.

Family Notices

en-nz

2021-09-25T07:00:00.0000000Z

2021-09-25T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://fairfaxmedia.pressreader.com/article/282527251582551

Stuff Limited