Holsey Shrugs Off Adversity

Jess Holsey had seen a lot of things written next to her name in the stat column, but DNP was certainly not one of them.

And the bench? She only saw it during timeouts.

A speedy, defense-savvy guard with a nice shooting touch, Holsey spent her high school career shredding defenses and terrorizing opposing point guards. In her final year at the Sidwell Friends School, she added some hardware to her already stacked resume. The 5’8 point guard was named a McDonald’s All-American, a Street & Smith All-American, and was ranked the No. 18 point guard in the nation by the All-Star Girl’s Report in 2002.

When Holsey signed with Harvard, women’s basketball coach Kathy Delaney-Smith knew she had made a steal.

“She is one of the most athletic guards you will ever see in women’s basketball,” Delaney-Smith says.

High school teams certainly knew that about her. After compiling 2,180 points and 380 steals at Sidwell Friends, the explosive Holsey looked to bring the same energy to a Harvard team coming off an Ivy League Championship in 2001. And after beginning her freshman season averaging 15 minutes per game, she started to settle in nicely at Lavietes Pavilion.

But then it happened, as it would happen three more times in the next two years.

In the season’s second to last game, Holsey went to swat a ball away from a Yale guard, but instead of coming up with the steal, she came away with a stinging shoulder. Her right shoulder popped out of its socket, putting the rest of her freshman season on hold.

The shoulder immediately settled back into place, but Holsey—a right-handed shooter—would be too sore to play in Harvard’s last game against Brown. Her teammates went on to an undefeated Ivy League campaign, earning an automatic berth in the NCAA Tournament. A recovering Holsey returned to practice, but she reinjured her shoulder just days before the Crimson’s trip to the NCAAs.

“On Selection Sunday, we go to a restaurant after practice and watch ESPN,” Holsey says. “Everybody was really excited, and I was sitting there in my sling. I was so depressed because I wanted to play so badly.”

Hurt or not, the young Maryland native wasn’t about to miss her first March Madness experience. Holsey played minimally in the Crimson’s 79-69 loss to Kansas State, her shoulder protected by an enormous padded brace.

Holsey closeted the brace for her sophomore season, optimistic that her off-season rehabilitation program had strengthened her right shoulder.

Her production reflected that confidence, as she started Harvard’s first seven games and scored a career-high 15 points against Florida State.

The high school superstar was again primed to become an impact player—this time at the collegiate level.

But then the brace came back. Holsey re-aggravated her shoulder while fighting for a loose ball in practice, and she missed the next four games. Upon returning to the lineup, Holsey injured her shoulder twice more, and doctors recommended surgery. A devastated Holsey, her play severely limited by the brace, wouldn’t regain complete confidence for the rest of the season.

“She was playing with a lot of fear and a lot of pain,” Delaney-Smith says. “I think she’s been devastated by it.”

This season couldn’t come fast enough for the frustrated Holsey, who underwent shoulder surgery over the summer to correct the recurrent problem. Her recovery comes just at the right time for the Crimson, which graduated four-time First-Team All-Ivy forward Hana Peljto and three-point threat Bev Moore last year. With Peljto gone, Harvard needs to find another offensive presence to complement captain center Reka Cserny.

And after having watched from the sidelines last year, Holsey is more than willing to fill that void.

“I want to be a scorer,” she says.

Holsey’s two breakout games at the end of last season—she had 15 points against Yale and 11 against Brown—displayed flashes of the prolific scorer who averaged 22 points per game as a high school senior. And despite battling the injury all of last season, Holsey shot 39 percent from three-point land, good for third on the team.

“I think I was more hesitant to shoot the three last year, because I knew that my shot was different, and it was streaky,” Holsey says. “But I’ve been working on it, and it feels good not to have that brace on.”

Without the brace, she has overcome any initial hesitancy at drawing contact in the lane. The cumbersome brace altered Holsey’s shooting form as well as her right-handed lay-ups, forcing her to shy away from contact and attack the basket less frequently. Consistent pain in her right shoulder made driving the lane even more difficult.

But Holsey’s confidence has soared since the shoulder surgery, and the guard’s quickness and penetration off the dribble should provide teammates with more opportunities behind the arc. Holsey’s speed has opened up 1-on-1 opportunities for her as well, and her emerging presence has teammates and coaches impressed.

“Everybody can see how good she is,” Cserny says, “and I think by now she feels it too.”

Despite the two-year delay, Holsey is beginning to live up to the high school hype that surrounded her upon her arrival in Cambridge.

“Although she did play last year and the year before, she really didn’t. She only had one arm,” Delaney-Smith says. “She looks great.”

A healthy Holsey will give Delaney-Smith more flexibility in the backcourt, and the coach hopes to play her at shooting guard while backcourt running mate Laura Robinson runs the point.

Point guard or not, Holsey’s just happy to be back on the court.

“I’m not thinking about the past at all,” Holsey says. “I don’t think about high school anymore, either. I just hope that whatever my team needs me to do, I’ll be able to do it.”

Two years removed from high school and one from a crippling injury, Holsey has far more to think about than the brace buried at the back of her closet.

She’s seen the sideline enough.

This year, it’s time the dusty high school record books made way for the Harvard ones.