Women's basketball

Senior forward Emily Cady carries Nebraska into NCAA tournament, matchup with Syracuse

Courtesy of Nebraska Media Relations

Senior forward Emily Cady and the Nebraska drew a No. 9-seed and a date to square off with eighth-seeded Syracuse on Friday at 7:30 p.m. in the first round of the NCAA tournament in Columbia, South Carolina.

Emily Cady ignored her coach.

Connie Yori had cancelled practice for Nebraska on Monday because the team planned to watch the selection show together later that night. But Cady refused rest.

She went to the gym anyway — as she always does on off-days — hoisting shot after shot on the machine she calls “The Gun.” After maybe 200 shots, she switched the machine off. Cady moved to the charity stripe and kept shooting, and shooting, and shooting. She doesn’t know how long she stood there, or how many free throws she attempted. Cady only stops when her arms start to ache.

“Usually on off days, I just come in and shoot,” said Cady, a senior forward. “That’s basically all I do.”

Cady is, as her teammates describe her, a leader by example. Her play late in the season, after Nebraska lost one of its top scorers, willed the team into the postseason. To her teammates, she is equal parts friend and demanding boss. That, coupled with a competitive nature unable to be satisfied, makes her indispensable.



Cady and the Cornhuskers (21-10, 10-8 Big Ten) drew a No. 9-seed and a date to square off with eighth-seeded Syracuse (21-9, 11-5 Atlantic Coast) on Friday at 7:30 p.m. in the first round of the NCAA tournament in Columbia, South Carolina.

“I wouldn’t want to spend my senior year not having a postseason,” Cady said. “Coach tells me to shoot more and I feel like I have to be more aggressive and help the team out as much as I can.”

Cady pushed the team in the absence of Rachel Theriot — the junior point guard who led the Cornhuskers in every offensive statistical category before undergoing season-ending ankle surgery on Feb. 19 — as Nebraska won three of five games down the stretch. Cady averaged 17.2 points and 10 rebounds per game during that time.

When Nebraska practices, the team runs a drill called Olympic one-on-one. One person starts with the ball under the hoop, passes it out to someone the top of the key and charges to play defense. One-on-one ensues.

“It’s hard to practice against her,” teammate Allie Havers said. “When you’re in line to go against Emily, you know it’s going to be a battle … You don’t want to play against her, but you do because you know you’ll get better from it.”

It’s Cady’s diverse skill set, her ability to dribble, shoot and post-up, which makes her such a challenge, Havers said. But the moments Cady works with, or plays against, Havers in practice leads to tangible benefits.

Earlier this season against Iowa, Havers, a 6-foot-5 post player, got caught out on the perimeter against a much smaller guard. Havers thought back to practice, if she could guard Cady, she could guard anybody. She played measured defense, not allowing her opponent to drive, and forced a bad pull-up jumper. Cady collected the rebound off the miss.

“She won’t let anybody get away with anything, because she knows that this is her last year,” Havers said. “If she’s going to work hard for it, she expects everyone else to.”

Cady always gets emotional when she loses. Whether it’s on the court, in the five-spot shooting drill at practice or betting aggressively on poker or blackjack against her three roommates in their townhouse, she’ll react the same way. It doesn’t matter if she’s playing Nintendo 64 with her friends or even challenging five teammates at Kim Kardashian: Hollywood, the iPhone game.

When she can’t beat a game or beat others in it, she’ll just stop playing all together. Cady wants to be the best at everything, and that’s what makes her so successful, senior Hailie Sample said. If the team needs a scorer, she’ll score. She’ll play defense, run the floor hard, do the little things right.

Facing Syracuse on Friday, Cady will lead the Cornhuskers into battle with its season on the line, hoping to do enough little things to put the team through to the next round.

“If we lose, we’re done and our Nebraska careers are over,” Sample said. “I don’t think anybody’s ready for that.”





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