THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, June 19, 1996 TAG: 9606190557
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C8 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY VICKI L. FRIEDMAN, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 73 lines
Former Old Dominion basketball standouts Esther Benjamin, Celeste Hill and Andrienne Goodson are among the 122 players who will be sitting by the phone today as the American Basketball League conducts its inaugural draft in San Jose, Calif.
The new women's professional league, which begins play in mid-October in eight cities, will pick from a pool of players who survived the ABL tryouts May 28 to June 2 at Emory University in Atlanta. Also included in the draft: 10 members of the U.S. National Team who have signed agreements to play in the league and eight other top-drawer players who have committed to the league but were unable to attend the tryouts. The cities with teams are Richmond, Atlanta, Columbus, Denver, Hartford/Springfield, San Jose, Seattle and Portland, Ore.
Hill, the Colonial Athletic Association Player of the Year three straight times from 1992-94, who ranks fifth on ODU's career scoring list with 2,112 points, played in Israel the past two seasons.
``I'm ready to play in front of American fans,'' said the 5-foot-9 forward, who is spending the summer running a youth program in Covington, Ky. ``I'd prefer Richmond because just being at ODU and the great fan support there, going back to that area would help bring fans in. Not that I'd be the one bringing them in, but it would be nice for them to have someone they know.''
The league will assign two premier players per team based on competitive balance and regional popularity. Teams will select eight players (rounds 3 through 10) and three alternates. Each team is entitled to one territorial pick, which will be announced at the start of the draft. Most of the assigned players will be members of the U.S. National Team who have signed two-year contracts with the ABL.
Players will be paid an average salary of $70,000 and a minimum of $40,000. The players will also own 10 percent of the league, which was founded by former Silicon Valley executive Steve Hams, Atlanta businessman Bobby Johnson, former Stanford athletic director Gary Cavalli and U.S. Olympic swimming gold medalist Anne Cribbs.
The ABL is one of two imminent women's professional leagues. The NBA will announce details this summer about the Women's National Basketball Association, set to begin play in the summer of 1997.
Benjamin, back home in Valdosta, Ga., said she considered the ABL after talking with ODU coach Wendy Larry. ``I'm hoping my chances of making a team are pretty good,'' said the 6-3 forward, who averaged 6.6 points and 5.3 rebounds as a senior. ``They had some big girls there, though, who made me look pretty small.''
Tryouts, with some of the sport's marquee names such as Tennessee's Michelle Marciniak, MVP of the 1996 NCAA National Championship, Stanford's Sonja Henning and Virginia's Dena Evans, attracted more than 570 players.
Goodson, who averaged 9.5 points on the Lady Monarchs' 1985 national championship team and was a 1988 honorable mention Kodak All-American, had been playing in Brazil since 1991. ``I was going to go back down to Brazil, but I tried out; it was a last-minute thing,'' she said. ``I stopped thinking about doing it and decided to jump.''
Hill enjoyed her experience overseas but looks forward to the prospect of competing without the hassles of foreign living. ``I'd like to know I have a choice of where I live, how I get to and from practice, what food I eat,'' she said. ``Plus here you'd have to come every day to play. In Israel, the practices weren't very strong.''
Training camps will open in mid-September, with the regular season running from October through February, concluding with playoffs in early March. Each team will play a 40-game schedule.
Former University of Richmond coach Tammy Holder is the coach and general manager of the Richmond franchise, which will split its home games between the Coliseum and the Robins Center. ILLUSTRATION: Former ODU stars Esther Benjamin (top), Celeste Hill
(middle) and Adrienne Goodson are among the 122 players who are
eligible for the inaugural American Basketball League draft today.
The new women's professional league will have eight host cities,
including Richmond, and play is scheduled to begin in mid-October. by CNB