Any builder will tell you the first step to erecting a solid structure is laying the foundation.
Kansas coach Marian Washington could have been a carpenter in another life.
She and her staff assembled a talented core of youngsters that should give the Jayhawks the base to build a skyscraper, and they have already signed two workers to finish the roof.
Lauren Ervin, of Inglewood High School in California, and Sharita Smith, of Lincoln High School in Dallas, have completed the paperwork to join Washington’s crew, signing letters of intent last week.
Smith, a 5-foot-8 guard, should complement freshman point guard Erica Hallman, Miss Kentucky Basketball in 2002. Like Hallman, Smith was already nationally known by the time she was a junior. She was named a Street & Smith preseason All-American this season and was tabbed among the 40 best players in the country by two online recruiting services. All Star Girls Report ranked her 37th, and Blue Star picked her 35th.
Her mother, Charva VanZant, said that Smith’s greatest addition to the young Jayhawks would be calculated by another measure ” victories.
“She’s awesome out there on that court,” VanZant said. “If their team is in trouble, Sharita knows how to pull it out.”
Assuming a leadership role with the Jayhawks should be no problem.
see SIGNEES on page 16A
Smith believed she fit in from the first time she stepped onto campus, VanZant said.
“She was like ‘Oh, Mom, this is it,'” VanZant said.
Ervin, a 6-foot-3 forward, was on the want list for many of the nation’s premier women’s basketball programs ” including Tennessee and Texas ” and rightfully so. She averaged 21 points and 15 rebounds per game as a junior before transferring schools and sitting out the remainder of the season. All Star Girls Report ranks her as the sixth-best senior in the country and Blue Star rates her fifth. She was also selected to the West Team in the USA Youth Development Festival ” an invitation-only tournament composed of the best women’s high school players in the country.
All those honors don’t mean that Ervin will come to Kansas without a few question marks.
Marissa Cruz coached Ervin during her freshman season at Bishop Montgomery High and said she could be tough to handle.
“She thought she knew everything and didn’t want to listen,” Cruz said.
Now in her first season as coach of Inglewood, Cruz has been reunited with Ervin and has changed her assessment.
“When I heard she was on the team, I was worried,” Cruz said. “But after I sat down and talked with her honestly, I realized she had matured a lot.”
That may be true, but Ervin has not completely outgrown her tendency to unwieldy behavior.
During the USA festival in June, Ervin was suspended from the West Team for the final game after her involvement in a fight with teammates Imani Dhahabu, Richmond, Calif., and Crystal Erwin, Pico Rivera, Calif.
Washington said she didn’t foresee any problems with Ervin, disciplinary or otherwise.
“What we want her to know is that we have expectations here, both in the classroom and certainly on the court,” Washington said. “But she chose to come here, and she understands that we have standards here and expectations.
“I believe a lot of times that young people really want that. They want that discipline. They to want to be held accountable. I’m really looking forward to working with her.”
Cruz agreed with Washington. She said that Ervin chose Kansas because she was looking forward to escaping the distractions surrounding her on the West Coast.
Ervin did not reply to numerous interview requests left with Cruz.
