Danville's Kasey Young (33) has turned down an opportunity to visit other schools and verbally committed to Eastern Kentucky University. (Clay Jackson) |
She can’t sign a scholarship for another year, but Kasey Young has already decided where she will play college basketball.
The Danville junior guard-forward has verbally committed to Eastern Kentucky University to play for coach Chrissy Roberts. She will become the first Danville female basketball player to be awarded a Division I basketball scholarship.
“I really liked the program and I liked what they’re about. Coach Roberts is a really good coach and when I visited everyone was really friendly and made me feel at home,” Young said. “They really emphasized shooting and scoring and stuff, and our basketball philosophy (at Danville) is kind of the same.”
Young has established herself as one of the top outside shooters in the state.
She scored a team-high 15.3 points per game last year for the Admirals. She shot 37 percent from 3-point range, going 76 of 105, and made 80 percent of her free throws (102 of 127). She ranked third in the state in 3-pointers made per game. As a freshman, Young averaged 14.8 points per game and was 77-for-204 from 3-point range (37 percent), and was 60 of 75 from the foul line.
For her career, Young has scored 1,091 points, with 135 steals, 104 assists and 379 rebounds. She is a 34.3 percent career 3-point shooter.
Young will be going into a program that finished 6-21 last year, including 3-14 in the Ohio Valley Conference. Eastern has two seniors on this year’s roster, and eight juniors.
“They really needed a guard for my year and coach Roberts felt I would be a great asset to the team,” she said. “They score a lot in transition, and that’s usually how I score the most when Essence (Grey) just feeds me the ball on the outside. They have a great point guard and can get me the ball.”
Coach Judie Mason said Eastern is a good fit for a number of reasons, and once Young had her mind made up, there was little anyone could say to change it.
“She’s pretty headstrong and that’s what she wanted to do, verbally commit and get the pressure off,” Mason said. “It’s Division I, it’s close to home and I think she can play early on, which is good.”
Listed at 5 feet, 10 inches, Mason expects Young could still grow, which should make her a matchup problems for bigger forwards and smaller guards at the next level. Young agreed, saying she was going to work more on her post game to get ready for college.
There was a long list of schools Young was considering before deciding on Eastern. She had also been recruited by Mid-American Conference power Bowling Green, as well as Gardner-Webb, Youngstown State, Florida Atlantic, North Florida, Milligan College and Miami (Ohio).
But since choosing the Colonels, Young cancelled her visit to Bowling Green and said she will not schedule any other visits.
“I don’t think I have to make any other visits because I’m really confident I want to go to Eastern and they’ve already made me feel at home,” she said.
Even though Young is glad to have her college pick decided, she wasn’t feeling any pressure to make a decision.
“The pressure doesn’t really bother me, and I didn’t really think about it too much,” she said.“
