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University of Oklahoma Athletics
Role Reversal Highlights Camp Month
June 24, 2011 | Women's Basketball
June 24, 2011
NORMAN, Okla. -- Imagine the thoughts of the 9-year-old who gazed upon the handwritten note of encouragement received from Ashley Paris Thursday at the conclusion of month of camps that flooded the Lloyd Noble Center.
Recognize that the past four days with the hopeful third-grader meant a great deal more to the idol-turned-personal tutor and the former teammates with whom she sweated in tandem to mentor today's rising stars and those just looking to have some fun on a toasty June morning.
"The camp experience is about coming, having fun and getting better," Paris said. "Competing against kids your age, getting to meet new people and just working as hard as you can with people that know what they're doing at a high level.
"It's a good experience ... to help encourage people to get to the next level and keep working hard. I like doing it."
More than 1,200 campers from 15 states, as far away as New York, California and Hawaii, descended on Norman over the past three weeks to meet new friends, reconnect with old ones, and develop their skills at one or more of the five women's basketball clinics offered by Sherri Coale and her staff of current and former players.
A number those Sooners -- from the most recent alumna, Carlee Roethlisberger, to LaNeisha Caufield-Daniels, who ran the offense one decade ago, to Roxanne Long, a member of Coale's first OU team -- return not only to help feed the knowledge, but reconnect and relive the relationships that highlighted their collegiate careers.
"For me, (the best part of camp)," Abi Olajuwon said, "is just getting the chance to hang out with my teammates again and getting to know these new freshmen who are coming in and the freshmen that were there last year. I don't know that I appreciated it when I was here, the alumni always coming back.
"It's great to see people I played with and also, you know, just great to be in the system again. It makes you feel like you're right back at home."
Olajuwon's Sooner teammate Amanda Thompson echoed those sentiments and glowed when revealing her emotions about her camp experience.
"I remember going to camp and going to work one-on-one," Thompson said. "I just remember going back and having fun and I want to have the same type of effect on these kids. It gave me energy. When I'm coming in the early morning and was tired, I just got automatic energy from the kids just having fun and screaming and getting better."
Every former camper-turned-coach reminisced on childhood memories of their days in summer basketball camps, but the shared experience of two current Sooners was a relatable source of humiliation as senior Jasmine Hartman and sophomore-to-be Aaryn Ellenberg told the stories of how they scored wide-open buckets in the other team's goal.
"That was pretty embarrassing," Ellenberg said, "but, at least I scored a point."
Despite those early miscues, Ellenberg and Hartman made their dreams come true and are now returning the favor.
"You just have leadership now and people look up to you," Hartman said. "The kids are excited to see you and you just want to give back and just appreciate what you've done in the past."
"They're all really eager to learn," Ellenberg said. "They want to be like us, so teaching those simple little things (to make their game better) just makes their day."
Between whistle blows, Hartman and Ellenberg recited instructions similar to what they hear much of the other 11 months of the year as progression through a week of camp resembles the Sooners' game preparation.
"A lot of things they do in camp here are the same thing that (Coach Coale) does in practice," Paris said. "I just think it's a good experience because once I got to college I realized how much being able to go to those camps helped benefit me."
So, in the near future, when Paris' words are re-read by the young camper before practicing jump shots in her driveway, she'll know she's on the same path the former Sooner star and her teammates once trekked.
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