STATE COLLEGE, Pa. – Every day when Joya McFarland sees Jeff Paige, her coach with the CAS Douglass Panthers, she asks him if she grew. To say the 5-foot-4 John F. Kennedy sharpshooter is preoccupied with her height would be an understatement.
McFarland’s father, Levern, teases her all the time about her lack of size and she knows the taller she is the more college interest she’ll attain.
“I don’t feel like I’m too small, but I don’t feel comfortable with my height,” McFarland said. “In college, everyone’s gonna be huge.”
The only thing huge about McFarland, aside from perhaps the boisterous guard’s mouth, has been her game this week. She scored 24 points against the WBA Lady Knicks following up a 17-point performance earlier in the day against the Germantown (Md.) Panthers. McFarland, Paige said, is “becoming a star” this travel season and not just because of her uncanny shooting ability. The rising senior has been taking the ball to the basket more and earning 3-point plays instead of just hoisting 3s.
“She was labeled as one of the best shooters only,” said Paige, who is also an assistant at Kennedy. “So once we realized that – ‘shooters only’ – we had to add a little something to it. We’re hoping that works.”
Added McFarland: “That’s what I’ve been practicing.”
The lefty gunner has not yet drawn significant interest from college coaches, though. Paige says she has some Division III interest, but he expects that to grow as the summer wears on. Two weeks ago, McFarland and Kennedy teammate Leshauna Phinazee went to the Hoop Mountain All-Academic Showcase at Brandeis University and some of the schools that saw her there have begun to call, but her goal is to earn a scholarship to college, whether it be Division I or II.
In order to do that, though, McFarland thinks she has to gain some more height. She isn’t worried. The jokester says she can feel those inches coming.
“I think I’m having a growth spurt, because my appetite has increased so much,” she said. “I have like six meals a day.”
Paige shakes his head at the notion. With her skills, he said, McFarland doesn’t need to worry about that.
“Her confidence is the only thing that’s keeping her from D-I,” Paige said.
It’s something McFarland says she’s working on. She looked fearless Wednesday in attacking the rim and even seems more willing on defense, an aspect of the game she was routinely criticized for by Kennedy coach O’Neil Glenn this season.
Even her minor obsession with tallness is something McFarland says she can put behind her. Yet in the same breath, she was jokingly hesitant to reveal her true height of 5-foot-4.
“I’m growing,” McFarland said with a wide smile. “So by the time this comes out I might be a little bit taller.”