North Carolina State University Athletics
PEELER: Fields' Marathon Season Coming to an End
3/5/2009 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
BY TIM PEELER
RALEIGH, N.C. As a freshman, Shayla Fields couldn’t get on the court to play for NC State’s basketball team. The funny thing is, she wasn’t in good enough shape to keep up with her teammates.
Now, as a senior point guard for the Wolfpack, she hardly ever comes out of the lineup, and no one on her team or on the opposing team can really keep up with her.
Heading into today's opening round of the ACC Tournament -- the Wolfpack tips off against Wake Forest at 3 p.m. at the Greensboro Coliseum -- Fields has played nearly three more minutes per game than any other player in the ACC, an average of 38.7 minutes per contest. In ACC games, she’s actually averaging more than 40 minutes, thanks to the three overtime games the Wolfpack has played in conference action.
Fields, a second-team All-ACC selection, is third in the league in scoring and ranks highly in several other categories. More importantly, however, is that the lone senior on the Wolfpack roster has been the team’s solid emotional leader during the most difficult season in school history, because of the passing of women’s head coach Kay Yow.
“She is someone who has shown great perseverance and mental toughness,” said interim head coach Stephanie Glance. “She never comes out. She is called on to be the leading scorer, the playmaker, the person who handles the ball all the time, the person who has to defend the other team’s best backcourt player. We have called on her to do so many things on the court and to do so many things as an emotional leader off the court.
“With all we have been through this year, it has quadrupled her responsibilities. She has been an unbelievable person to carry the weight she has been asked to carry.”
Fields, who scored only three points as a freshman, has worked her way into the top 20 among the school’s career scoring leaders and might have finished in the top 10 had she scored more as a freshman. Her 17.5 scoring average is the Wolfpack’s highest since Summer Erb averaged 21.5 points in 1998-99.
Fields came to NC State from Salisbury High School, where she averaged more than 26 points a game in leading her team to the 2-A Regional finals as a senior and an undefeated season and state championship as a junior.
But she gained weight during the summer before her freshman year and lagged behind her teammates when the season began. She was down on herself, but never down on the game. She worked constantly with Glance to improve her chances of getting more playing time. That never really came as a freshman, when she played in just five games.
“I wasn’t ready for my freshman year,” Fields said. “I had numerous meetings with my coaches and they kept encouraging me to do the best that I could. They said playing time will come, and it has. It’s been a big turnaround. I guess it shows that hard work pays off.”
Fields admits that this season has taken a huge emotional toll on her and her teammates. Basketball has been almost secondary as they have dealt with Yow’s leave of absence in December and her death in late January.
But she wouldn’t trade being the last Wolfpack player to play four years under Yow for anything, even if her whole career has been defined by Yow’s fight with cancer. The coach was recruiting Fields when she learned that the breast cancer that had first been diagnosed in 1987 the year Fields was born had returned.
Fields was a sophomore when Yow took a 16-game leave of absence then returned to lead the Wolfpack to an appearance in the NCAA Sweet 16.
“It’s been very special for me,” Fields said. “The Hoops4Hope game started my freshman year, and I have been here for all of them. I was glad to be a part of the program during the time that she went through so much and still started the foundation she has put in place for cancer research.
“I can say that I have been here for it all, and that is something that will always be special for me.”
Glance knows better than anyone how much Fields has developed as a player and a person. As the associate head coach under Yow, she spent hours working with Fields in individual drills trying to improve her game enough to contribute on the ACC level. To see her blossom over the last three years has been a great reward.
“We always knew what she could do,” Glance said. “We wanted her to hang in there. We told her If you just keep going, you never know how close you are to the top.’ How rewarding for her to have the career that she has had, after the way it started.
“I have a lot of respect for Shayla as a person and as a player, because she stuck with it. I believe if more young people would just stick with it, life would be so much more rewarding for them.”
Sometimes those rewards come in the form of points or minutes played or all-star honors. Fields eventually received all of those things, and much more, during a career that was defined by Yow’s strength and perseverance.
You may contact Tim Peeler at tim_peeler@ncsu.edu
