It’s A Whole New Ballgame Mindy Rice’s Jump To UI Basketball Proves Her Considerable Talent

Mindy Rice, you’ve just been named an All-America volleyball player. What are you going to do next?

Camera pans to a smiling Rice. “I’m going to play for the University of Idaho basketball team.”

Uh, wait a minute Mindy, that’s not exactly Disneyland. Have you thought this over? You’re going from a 31-3 UI volleyball team to a basketball bunch that - let’s be politically correct here - is victory-challenged.

“I think I’ve been a little spoiled since I got here with all the winning,” said Rice, the most unassuming superstar this side of John Stockton. “I’ve really come to appreciate winning a lot more.”

OK, we’ll come clean. Rice didn’t say that first comment. But she did say the second. And she meant it, with no intention of downgrading her hoop teammates.

It’s a whole new ballgame for Rice, one of the finest athletes to compete for Idaho - and the Big Sky Conference, for that matter.

In Rice’s four years of volleyball, the Vandals won 74 percent of their matches and made three trips to the NCAA Tournament. Rice became the Big Sky’s first All-American, making second team. “Mind boggling,” she says of the honor.

UI basketball was 0-6 when Rice joined in mid-December. The Vandals would slip to 0-9 (Rice missed one game to receive her volleyball award at a banquet in Texas) before winning four of their last nine prior to meeting Montana State on Saturday night.

She’s playing because she loves basketball, she can handle a little adversity and she believes in coach Julie Holt’s building process. So much so that Rice has already committed to playing next year.

“I think if I wasn’t playing, I would regret it,” Rice said. “When you are in this situation you have to look at things besides wins and losses and look at the improvements in myself and the team. We’ve improved, it just doesn’t always show up in our record.

“I have opened up (to volleyball teammates) and said that losing really sucks and it’s frustrating. But if you can’t handle that, then you shouldn’t be here.”

How does Rice deal with losing? By trying to win.

“I still go into weekends thinking we’re going to win, even this weekend (against Montana and Montana State) against two tough teams. I guess that’s a good thing to do, but it’s difficult to think that we might not (win).”

It took extraordinary restraint for Holt not to hound Rice.

“As soon as I got the job (last spring), that’s the first thing everyone told me was to try to get her out. Everybody was pressuring her and nobody was leaving her any space to do what she wanted,” Holt said. “I left her alone.”

After her senior year of volleyball, Rice showed up in Holt’s office and rewarded Holt’s patience. With the departure of centers Brenda Rademacher (quit team) and Jeri Hymas (academics), the 6-foot-1 Rice has been a godsend.

“Since day one, when she stepped on the floor, everybody has recognized we needed help at that position,” Holt said.

With two days’ practice, Rice scored 10 points against Washington State in her first game. She’s scored in double figures in every game and her high is 25.

“I’m just finally getting a hold of things now,” Rice said.

If Rice had played in the requisite 75 percent of games, she would be second in Big Sky scoring and first in rebounding and field-goal percentage.

Rice isn’t a newcomer to basketball. Playing for Rimrock High in Grand View, Idaho, she netted a state-record 45 points in a State A-4 tournament game. But she concentrated on volleyball since arriving in Moscow.

“I was a little surprised at how good she was so quickly,” Holt said. “She looked very natural. She’s an athlete.”

UI volleyball coach Tom Hilbert first noticed Rice’s athleticism at a spike camp.

“She was at the net as a target for other players to pass to,” Hilbert said. “Someone passed her the ball and it was going to go over the net. She went up about 2 feet above the net and snagged it like a rebound.

“The first thing that went through my mind was, `How am I going to keep anybody from finding out about her?”’

Most Big Sky schools did find out about Rice, but she enjoyed her recruiting visit to Moscow. She didn’t enjoy her visit to Boise State, about an hour’s drive north of Grand View.

“I’m a pretty religious (LDS) person, I don’t drink and I would think they knew that,” said Rice, who hopes to teach and coach someday. “But they took me out to a party.”

BSU’s version is that Rice didn’t get along with Broncos players.

“You won’t find anybody that doesn’t like Mindy,” Hilbert said. “One of the things I most admire about her is I’ve never heard her say a negative word about a teammate.”

Hilbert hopes Rice will continue playing volleyball. He’s pushing her to try out for the U.S. Olympic Festival team (she was cut last year).

Like most superior athletes, Rice is a self-starter. But there were other sources of motivation.

The youngest of nine children, Rice hung out with her brothers - particularly Scott, four years her elder.

“He picked on me a lot,” Mindy said, “but I have to credit him because he taught me how to catch and throw.”

Sports - basketball, baseball and football - was the common pastime.

Football?

“Yeah,” Rice grinned.

Tackle?

“Oh yeah.”

Hey, is it too late to give that sport a try?