Commentary: Plum performance, career, one of the best ever at UW
We start with a well-documented story that deserves attention again tonight: Possibly the most important text message in UW athletics history.
Four words: “You stay. I stay.” Kelsey Plum to Mike Neighbors in 2013. Neighbors stayed at UW after being promoted to head coach. Plum stayed true to her original commitment to the Dawgs.
The rest, of course, is history.
What Plum did yesterday was legendary – and we don’t use that word lightly. To break the NCAA’s all-time career scoring record on Senior Day with a school-record 57 points the last time she ever played on her home court, is worthy of an Oscar for best performance. And it cements her status among the greatest collegiate basketball players ever in our country’s history.
When it comes to the best of the best – no qualifiers are needed: Not for gender, not for sport, not for situation, nor opponent. The great ones have a flair for the dramatic – the unexpected – period. The great ones have the ability to make the seemingly impossible come true.
And that’s what Plum has done. Not just last night – but throughout her entire career at UW.
She arrived to play for a program that had essentially fallen off everyone’s radar. A team that hadn’t made the NCAA Tournament in seven seasons – that hadn’t finished a season in the AP Top 25 in close to 20 years. And here she is now, a senior whose resume includes a Final Four, the first sellout crowd in Husky women’s basketball history and what’s expected to be a third-straight appearance in the Big Dance. Oh, and more points that’s ever been scored in the history of the women’s game in Division I.
People shouldn’t be surprised that Golden State Warriors coach Steve Kerr gave Plum’s 57-point performance a shoutout in his postgame comments yesterday. They should be surprised that 15 other NBA coaches didn’t.
Because, as the saying goes: Game recognizes game. Plum has it – and it’s been a privilege to watch.
So whatever happens in this year’s postseason starting with the Pac-12 Women’s Tournament this week, Plum has already made her mark. Her collegiate legacy is already set – unless she wants to add more. And if she does, I encourage fans in this city to be at KeyArena as a witness, regardless of allegiance to school or to sport. Simply to say, “I saw Kelsey Plum play college basketball – one of the best there ever was.”
“You stay, I stay?” It’s the text message that started it all. One of the biggest “gets” in UW athletics history, saved somewhere on Mike Neighbors phone.
And appropriately, now Plum will be staying much, much longer on Montlake – this time, in the record books for many years to come.