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Fresh faces help Frogs to forge
forward By Brandon Ortiz Demetric Shaw was stunned. After calling foul after foul to stop the inevitable, he had just lost. He couldn’t believe it. The former Texas Wesleyan player had just lost to his daughter, Ebony, in basketball. “I’ll never forget the day she beat him,” Ebony’s mother Sheila Shaw said. “He started calling fouls everywhere. He couldn’t believe he lost. He came in and said, ‘I can’t believe she beat me.’ Then he whispered, ‘I think she’s ready.’” Her father can find relief in knowing that he is not the only one being beaten by Ebony Shaw these days. On a team loaded with upperclassmen, the freshman guard has emerged as the Frogs’ leading scorer off the bench, averaging 6.9 points and three rebounds in 12.4 minutes a game. Ebony Shaw is joined by freshman forward Tiffany Evans as head coach Jeff Mittie’s first two options off the bench. “We knew that if we were going to win the (Western Athletic Conference), (Ebony Shaw and Evans) were going to have to play,” associate head coach Larry Tidwell said. “We didn’t sign them to come over and sit on the bench and look pretty.” Evans and Ebony Shaw, as of late, haven’t been spending a whole lot of time on the bench. Evans is second on the team in rebounding with 5.5 a game, and she averages 5.8 points in 20.2 minutes a contest.
“I think both of them are having very good freshman years,” Mittie said. “We felt like both of these two would be in the mix in terms of working into the rotation (at the beginning of the season).” Both were heavily recruited nationwide out of high school. Tidwell had been following the two as an assistant coach at Southern Florida before joining the Frogs’ coaching staff. “I knew about them ever since they were freshmen in high school,” Tidwell said. “I have been following their careers for quite a while. Both of them bring tremendous athleticism. They can both get up and down the floor. They can drive and penetrate.” Evans can shoot three pointers well for a 6-footer,
while Ebony Shaw adds quickness on the court, Tidwell said. “Ebony is very athletic. She’s going to be something to watch over the coming years. I think she is going to be one of the best players to ever wear a TCU uniform.” Evans started playing basketball in the third grade when her parents signed her up to play in a church league. Evans has always had a little height advantage, she said. In between eighth and ninth grade she grew from 5 foot 8 inches to 6 foot 1 inch, she said. “I have always been the tall one,” Evans said. “In between eighth and ninth grade, I just shot up.” Evans said the biggest change from high school has been adjusting to stronger players and more weight lifting. “What really gave me a surprise was the weight lifting,” Evans said. “I’m still pretty weak.” Ebony Shaw came from a basketball family. Her brother, Demetric Jr., plays for Kent State. Ebony Shaw used to spend everyday playing basketball in the driveway, Sheila Shaw said. “It was brother, daddy and Ebony playing in the driveway everyday,” Sheila Shaw said. “I wanted her to become a cheerleader. I was a little outnumbered.” Ebony Shaw used to spend time beating boys in the gym in basketball. She was the only girl the high school coach would let play in the gym. “I was the only girl the coaches liked,” Ebony Shaw said. “The guys would fight over who would go up against me. They didn’t want to be embarrassed.” Her father used to take her to play against grown men when she was young. The men would run all over her until she got older and then the opposite happened. Sheila Shaw said that’s why she plays so rough. The play of Evans and Ebony Shaw has helped give the Frogs one of their best starts in the program’s history. For Ebony Shaw, it is vindication for those who questioned why she came to TCU. “At first I didn’t want to come to TCU, but they made me believe something good was going on,” Ebony Shaw said. “I didn’t really expect us to go on this winning streak like this. It’s good to experience this as a freshman. “People used to ask why I was going to TCU. I was like, ‘You’ll see.’ They should see us now.” Brandon Ortiz |
