When she collapsed under the basket clutching her knee during the Missouri women’s basketball game against Colorado Dec. 12, it was clear. Sophomore forward Kayla McDowell was out for the rest of the season with a torn anterior cruciate ligament.
The Tigers needed to sub in a player with a high level of athleticism. They needed a player with experience and a positive attitude.
They needed senior guard Bree Fowler.
“She’s been in that role at times here and there in the past,” Missouri coach Robin Pingeton said. “I think as a senior, you just want to be on the court. She’s working hard and playing a lot more confident. I think she’s really taken ownership of her senior year.”
Part of the reason Fowler is starting at forward is due to the current state of the other possible forwards. Junior Michelle Hudyn practiced briefly for the first time on Wednesday after her MRI on Nov. 10, but Pingeton said her status is a day-by-day situation.
A new addition to the team, 6-foot-3 redshirt freshman forward Davionna Holmes, is unable to play due to unspecified personal matters.
With the ambiguity of Holmes’ situation, it’s possible that she won’t be playing until next season, not making her a reliable replacement for McDowell.
Freshman forward Bri Porter is healthy, but despite putting up big numbers early in the season, she hasn’t been playing nearly as many minutes as she used to.
“I think she’s still hesitant and not sure where to go and when to screen, so we need to get her a little more comfortable.” Pingeton said. “We need to continue to challenge her to get a little more physical in her play, but these are controllable things, and I think we’re going to see her really take some giant strides over the next month or two.”
While tearing an ACL is never good news, McDowell’s injury ended up occurring at a very critical time. In the NCAA, a player has to have played under 30 percent of the season’s 29 games, or 8.7 games, before getting injured to be eligible to make up the season.
The NCAA rounds the games to nine and McDowell went down before completing last week’s Colorado game – her ninth game.
By barely making the cut, McDowell will be back for three more years of basketball, assuming her ACL is better by next season.
But McDowell is leaving big shoes for Fowler to fill.
“Defensively, position-wise, (McDowell’s) not afraid to bang,” Pingeton said. “She doesn’t shy away from physical contact, which is what the (Southeastern Conference) is all about. Offensively, she can put it on the floor pretty well, as we saw against Colorado. I think that was her best game of the season.”
Pingeton said she planned to switch around to a four-guard offense long before McDowell’s injury in order to combat the larger size of SEC opponents, since the Tigers are a comparatively small team.
The plan now is to have sophomore forward Jordan Frericks stay at the five-spot, where she’s been all season, and Fowler take the four-position on offense and cut out to a guard position while staying with Frericks in the forward spot on defense.
After coaching Fowler for the past four years, Pingeton feels she has what it takes to successfully handle this change.
“Part of it is her having that open-mindedness, Pingeton said, “but I also think a large part of it is in her athleticism and her understanding of her role on that court. At times, she can be a hard match, too, with her ability to get to the rim, and she shoots the three well enough that you have to respect it.”
While Fowler admits she hasn’t had much experience in the forward position, she does remember one instance in her freshman year when she was matched up against Brittney Griner, the 6-foot-8 Baylor forward currently playing in the WNBA as a first-round draft pick.
“It can’t get much harder than that,” Fowler said of the experience. “I like to think I’m pretty strong, so I think that helps me make up for not being as tall and being able to bang in there a little bit more.”
Fowler started at forward for the first time this season last Sunday against Northern Illinois, when she put up a career high eight rebounds.
“I really try to focus on screening my big man, getting them open because I know they’ll be able to block better than I am,” Fowler said. “So I’ll screen and pop out to the arc and fall into what I’ve known since I’ve been playing basketball, which is being a guard. I just try to make sure I get my teammates open and do the right things.”
In addition to an outstanding athlete, Pingeton praises Fowler’s selflessness and positive attitude to her teammates.
“For Bree, it’s never been about her,” Pingeton said. “It’s never been about her minutes or her playing time — she’s always putting her teammates first. She’s always encouraging, challenging, inspiring, motivating, both on and off the court. She always has a high-five for them, a pat on the back, a fist bump. She’s the epitome of what you’d want in a teammate.”
The Tigers will test out their new gameplan at Wake Forest Friday at 1 p.m. While Pingeton said the Demon Deacons will definitely present a challenge, she is still looking forward to the game.