STARKVILLE — Don’t put it past Jordan Danberry to attempt a trick shot.
If you have seen the Mississippi State senior play, you know the 5-foot-8 guard has a nasty handle and ankle-breaking quickness to become a whirling dervish. She also has extraordinary leaping ability, which enables her to play well above her size.
On Saturday, Danberry showed she is just as dangerous off one foot as she is off two.
Danberry capped a career-high 16-point effort Saturday by slithering in between defenders and starting and finishing a short jump shot off one leg in the No. 6 Mississippi State women’s basketball team’s 105-38 victory against Jackson State before a crowd of 6,953 at Humphrey Coliseum.
“I tried to do a pro hop and I think my leg got tangled up with one of the other player’s legs,” Danberry said. “I kind of do some shots like that in practice, so I am not unfamiliar with being off balance shooting the ball.”
Danberry has been doing a lot more shooting this season for the Bulldogs (6-0), who lost guards Victoria Vivians, Roshunda Johnson, Blair Schaefer, and Morgan William to graduation. Those four players took the majority of the shots by MSU guards in 2017-18, which explains why Danberry attempted 10 or more shots once and scored in double figures only three times in 31 games.
That doesn’t mean the transfer from Arkansas can’t score. At Conway High School in Arkansas, Danberry played point guard and was a two-time Gatorade Player of the Year in the state. She led her team to a state title as a junior and a runner-up finish as a senior while averaging 14.5 points and five assists per game. In fact, she shot 46 percent from 3-point range. Her coach, Ashley Nance, said about Danberry in 2015 the thing she liked most about her was her “ability to improve her game each year.”
Danberry is doing the same thing at MSU.
Last season, Danberry averaged 2.8 points and shot 36.5 percent from the field in 9.6 minutes per game. Those numbers likely would have been higher if Danberry would have been able to finish at least half of the sizzling moves she used to create shots. Danberry’s inability to finish more consistently last year might have been a result of her going too fast or not having confidence to take her shots. That has changed this season, as Danberry is attacking the basket and finding the seams in defenses to work on her mid-range game.
“I think I have raised it quite a bit just from finishing my shots, which is the main thing,” Danberry said. “I took a few shots last year, but I wasn’t as confident as I am this year, just knowing my role and finishing those shots. I feel like it is a big increase already.”
Danberry also is deadly in the Bulldogs’ dribble-drive weave at the top of the key. That set gives Danberry the best chance to work off defensive switches and move into space for open shots. Against Jackson State, she did that to the tune of a 7-for-11 shooting effort from the field. The 11 shots are the most she has taken as a Bulldog. Factor in three assists (zero turnovers) and three steals in 19 minutes and you have a line any coach would love.
“I just think she has a point guard mentality,” Schaefer said. “She has that kind of vision. She’s really good. She is really unselfish. Sometimes I want her to be more selfish than she is, but she is very unselfish. I just think she has been with us now where she is comfortable and she has a real value to our team. She has to be Jordan every night for us. She can’t have a bad night because I don’t have another one like her. … Jordan is really special. If she can develop that mid-range, which she is doing right now, that 15- to 12-footer, because she can get to her spot. I don’t care who is guarding her. You can’t keep her from getting there. If she can get that and develop that, she will make a lot of money after this is done because she is really good at it.
“She just keeps working at it. The thing I like about her is she has been working hard in practice every day. She doesn’t have too many bad days.”
Danberry admits she didn’t consider herself a “scorer” in high school. She said she “scored mainly when I was wide open or on a fast break,” and that she likes to pass first sometimes. Given the fact Danberry is averaging 11.2 points and is shooting 63 percent from the field, Schaefer likely will encourage Danberry to be a little more selfish when it comes to shooting the ball.
After all, Danberry showed Saturday she is just as dangerous off one leg as she is off two.
“She made a spin reverse counter move, and instead of getting both feet on the ground she only got one down, so she basically double-jumped into her shot,” Schaefer said. “She spun, reversed, jumped off the right, landed on her right and shot on her right. She never got her left leg back down. It was a heck of a shot. It was a heck of a move. I couldn’t believe it. I looked at (director of operations) Maryann (Baker) and asked her, ‘Did she just land on one leg because she took off on one leg?'”
Said Danberry, “It is exciting just knowing the coaches and my teammates have confidence in me. It helps with my confidence in myself as well. They’re always telling me if I get to my spot just shoot it, and I have been working on finishing.”
Follow Dispatch sports editor Adam Minichino on Twitter @ctsportseditor
Adam Minichino is the former Sports Editor for The Commercial Dispatch.
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