Harcum Womens' Basketball Heading to Nationals

The knowing didn’t come with nods, or eye contact with one another that implied anything about playing deep into March. The Lady Bears just knew. They had a sense with what they had, and with their experience, good things were bound to happen this year.

They have.

Now the Lady Bears are making history as the first Harcum womens basketball team to advance to the National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA) Division II National Tournament, hosted by Illinois Central College in Peoria, Illinois. The Lady Bears, an impressive 28-1 this season, will open the double-elimination, 16-team tournament as the No. 8 seed, opening with No. 9 seed Kalamazoo Valley next Tuesday.

“I think we did have a good idea we could get this far,” said Lady Bears coach Sheila DiNardo, whose team is ranked No. 9 in the country in NJCAA Division II. “We have a bunch of committed girls who like to win.”

Harcum is certainly fun to watch. The Lady Bears like to run, and run, and run. They’re ranked No. 4 nationally in offense, averaging 87.3 points a game. Yes, you saw that correctly—a college team that produces that much offense, that quickly. Forming the backbone of the Lady Bears is a pair of special players, 5-foot-5 sophomore Ana Cruz and 5-foot-7 sophomore Sironda Chambers.

To make history, you need historic players in the program. That’s been Cruz and Chambers. They are, respectively, the two highest scorers in school history. Cruz is Harcum’s all-time leading scorer, the first player in school history to score 1,000 points. She was selected as Region 19’s Player of the Year. Chambers isn’t far behind, as Harcum’s second all-time leading scorer, and she became Harcum’s second 1,000-point scorer, accomplishing the feat just three games after Cruz did.

“We both got big minutes as freshmen last year, and I think that’s what helped us this year,” Cruz said. “I also think what’s helped us is we’ve been setting goals as we’ve gone along. But we thought we could get here. We all really wanted this, and we’ve found a way to get it done. We definitely knew what we had, and the girls that came in with us as freshmen last year have helped, too.”

Key players include Alisa Robert (Penn Wood HS/Darby, Pa.), Alex Massado (St. Elizabeth/Wilmington, Del.), and Bianca Parker (Delcastle HS/New Castle, Del.).

Another big factor is the overall play of Chambers, who not only manages to score 20 points a game, but also averages 9.8 rebounds. It’s pretty remarkable, considering she’s a combo guard.

“I guess it’s just a knack for the ball,” said Chambers, who’s receiving attention from Rider, Maryland Eastern Shore and Northeastern, among other NCAA Division I schools. “I don’t think what we’ve done this year is a surprise at all. We have good chemistry, our offense is about constant movement. We’ve made it to nationals. We can’t stop here. I think we can do this. We’re all healthy. We all believe in each other’s talent.”