 "Photo: Tyler D. Griffis / The South End")
 "Photo: Tyler D. Griffis / Staff Photographer")
 "Photo: Ron Harper / Special to The South End")
Is it a coincidence that four stellar athletes, representing four different sports have achieved their success on the 35th anniversary of Wayne State women’s athletics ... or an indication of what the program’s future holds?
“I think it’s more (an) indication,” said softball pitcher Casey Hanes. “Things just keep getting better. We just happen to be here at 35 years.”
Her answer was supported by basketball guard Brooke Bowers, hockey defenseman Christine Jefferson, and swimmer Ashley St. Andrew.
All four expressed it is no coincidence, rather an indication, that they are concluding stellar careers at WSU.
These four careers have indicated one thing for sure: they are good, really good.
The success that they have all enjoyed — breaking records, All-Conference honors, All-American honors, championships won — is just the beginning of how far women athletics has come.
Ashley St. Andrew
St. Andrew has been a catalyst for the success of the women’s swimming and diving team. In 2009, she became the first woman at Wayne State to bring home a national title. Just to make sure her efforts weren’t over looked, she brought home two: the 500 and 1000 freestyle.
The swimming and diving team has taken advantage of the recent growing interest from the public.
“Obviously, everyone knows who Michael Phelps is now. It helps that people are now actually watching. People would watch the Olympics and just say, ‘Let’s watch swimming because he’s going for the gold medals,’ so it’s nice that people started to watch and actually know what’s going on,” St. Andrew said.
As a WSU swimmer, St. Andrew has given people a lot to know what’s going on. She holds six separate record times in the Wayne State records books, four of them in individual races. Throughout the years, as her times have gotten better, she often ended up breaking her own records.
“I think it’s helped a lot that we’ve been doing well,” she said. “We got to host GLIACs here this year which was really neat because a lot of people came and helped with the meet and enjoyed it and had a lot of fun.”
Despite her incredible efforts, she still quietly deflects the positive results in hopes of sharing more team success to serve as the positive light to shed on Wayne State.
“I think our team accomplishment has helped more,” she said. “We got second place in the nation. That’s pretty cool. I don’t think it was so much my individual accomplishment.”
As nice of a thing that is to say, it’s difficult to ignore the fact that her 2010 performance at the NCAA championships dwarfs what she did the previous year.
She repeated as champion in the same two events she won in 2009, then added a third title, the 1650 freestyle, giving her a total of five in her career.
At the 2010 championships, en route to the teams second consecutive second-place finish, she posted 76 points for the team, a number that exceeded 22 other teams over the course of the four-day event.
Brooke Bowers
One of the stigmas that women’s athletics faces is that it’s not as exciting or just simply not as good as the men’s sports. Don’t tell that to Bowers.
“Girls can play the sport. These days, some of the girls are more talented than the guys,” she said. “So it’s growing and that myth just needs to leave, because it’s not true anymore.”
Her thoughts may have something to do with the shadow she casts in the record books. Her 195 3-pointers made in her career go down as the most in Wayne State history. Men, women, boys, girls, Warriors, Tartars — everyone.
“I didn’t even know about it until it happened. But it’s quite an accomplishment just because the myth says that guys are better than girls,” Bowers said. “But any girl can go out there and beat a guy’s record. It’s pretty cool for a girl to have the overall record.”
Bowers concluded her career in Feb. 2010 ranking ninth or higher in seven different categories in the WSU history. She’s the 15th woman to score at least 1,000 points, but the first to every lead the team in three-point shooting for four straight years.
Bowers says she doesn’t worry about what people say when comparing the men’s game with the women’s game. She’s just happy to see that the women’s game is catching up and able to handle the mental and physical aspects of the game. In some regards, some respect should be given.
“I think guy’s basketball is more one-on-one while girl’s basketball focuses more on the team setting of the game. Just like with UConn winning 78 in a row, just shows that the women’s game is getting better. The best men’s record is 88 in a row,” she said.
Casey Hanes
While Bowers and St. Andrew have excelled at putting points on the board, Hanes specializes in keeping points off. She recorded her 1,000th collegiate strikeout April 10 while pitching her 50th career shutout.
Hanes is also one not to accept the notion of the girl’s game being simply not as good as the men’s game. So, she went and helped do something about it.
“At my old school, where I transferred from, we actually scrimmaged against the baseball team, and we actually won,” Hanes said. “Obviously, we’re different from guys. But comparing our level of athletic ability, it’s just different.”
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