That’s the title of one of Wonder’s greatest hits. It won two Grammys and a few years ago Rolling Stone ranked it No. 12 on its list of Greatest Songs of All Time.
As for Scott, Wright State’s 5-foot-7 junior guard, many of the underpinnings of her basketball career are rooted in superstition.
“I’m very superstitious,” she said Wednesday night after leading the Raiders’ fourth-quarter comeback in a 60-53 victory over Oakland at the Nutter Center.
With a bit of a laugh, she admitted: “There’s just so many layers to my superstitions.”
- They came into play when she hit her to-the-roof rainbow three pointer to finally put WSU in the lead for good, 52-49, with 2:46 left.
- They were responsible for her “old school” look on the court and even the way she got dressed before the game.
- They’re also evident in the classroom. “If I do well on a test, I’ll wear the same outfit for the next test, so I have the same luck,” she said.
Superstition dictates how she accessorizes her uniform. She wears two bulky kneepads — common to an era long past — but mimicked by none of her WSU teammates and only player on the Oakland roster.
“I know the look is a little rough; it doesn’t fit the aesthetic,” Scott said with a smile. “I agree it doesn’t look the best, but I’ve worn them since fifth grade.
“I always wanted to be the first one diving on the floor for a ball and my coach suggested them. After that, I decided, ‘Why change? I’ll stick with what works.’”
She said she goes through two sets of gray and two sets of black kneepads each season at WSU. She pointed to the holes in each of them now: “They’re always ripping.”
Before the game she always puts her left kneepad and shoe on first. She makes sure the most ripped pad — they get mixed up in the wash — always goes on her right knee and always is put on last.
The head band she wears and the way she twists her hair into a single braid that goes down her back are based on superstition, as well:
“All through high school and since, I haven’t played a day without it like that.”
But the thing that really sets Scott apart on the court is her drop-from-the-heavens three point shots.
Never mind the University of Hawaii, when you’re talking Horizon League basketball, the best-known Rainbow Warrior is Scott.
In three seasons with the Raiders, she’s launched 257 treys and made 92 (35.8 percent).
Her attempts are more like those of a skilled golfer lifting a wedge shot over a stand of trees and then having the ball drop straight down onto the green close to the pin.
She’s shot that way since she was a kid, she said.
“It definitely has some arc,” she laughed. “Maybe, it’s because I was a shorter player trying to shoot over height.
“And too, it just hangs up there and that gives it a better chance to go in since it has more of the rim to use.”
She said the two most prominent coaches in her life now have not tried to dissuade her from shooting like that.
WSU head coach Kari Hoffman laughed when asked about those high arc hoists: “She seems to have added some height to it this year. I don’t remember it being that rainbowy.
“I just told her, ‘You need to keep shooting it, but don’t try to push it or guide it. Just trust it.’ The one thing we did work on a little was her footwork.”
The other coach who keeps tabs on her hoop efforts is her grandfather, Gary Williams, the former college coach who guided the Ohio State Buckeyes for three seasons, led Maryland to a national championship in 2002, compiled an impressive 668-380 record at four schools and was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame and the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame.
He’s now a University of Maryland administrator, but she said he watches all her games on ESPN+ and will be at the Nutter Center for the team’s final regular-season game March 1.
She said he doesn’t overstep his bounds with Hoffman and just gives her personal tips on things like playing better defense.
As for her high-arc treys she said: “He’s a fan when they go in, for sure. He knows I’ve worked hard on my shooting over the years.”
While honing her shooting skill, she said she never was tempted to try retooling it into some low-altitude effort like everyone else:
“When something works, I don’t want to change it. I’m superstitious that way.”
‘She’s a coach’s dream’
By the time her junior season ended at Worthington Kilbourne High School, she had amassed 1,192 points.
She seemed certain to break the school record as a senior and already had committed to Wright State.
But four minutes into the opening game of her senior season, she was pushed from behind by a defender as she went up for a transition lay-up. She landed badly and tore her ACL.
“Wright State never wavered about taking me,” she said. “Some schools might have backed away, but they were great. They showed up for Senior Night, even though I wasn’t going to be on the court.”
Hoffman said the decision was simple: “The way we saw it — even if she was sidelined a little bit — she was as valuable to us off the court as she was on it.
“She’s a coach’s dream. She has all the intangibles. She has an incredible work ethic. She’s respectful and very coachable. There’s a toughness to her, too. On the court she’s usually guarding someone two inches taller, but she never backs down.”
Scott didn’t miss any games that first season. Counting Wednesday night – when she and Amaya Staton both had a game-high 15 points – she’s now played 88 games for the Raiders and has averaged eight points a contest.
“She’s one of the most experienced players on the team,” Hoffman said. “She’s been with us three years and she knows what to expect from us and what she expects from her teammates.
“She’s a great leader and her teammates really respect her.”
‘We’ve grown a lot’
The Raiders had an abysmal start this season. With a 69-51 loss at Green Bay on Jan. 4, they had lost 10 straight and were 2-14.
Since then they’ve gone 6-5 and now are 8-19. After Saturday’s game at Northern Kentucky, they’ll have two regular-season games left.
After three quarters Wednesday, Wright State trailed the Grizzlies — who’d beaten them by 14 points in December — 44-37.
But the Raiders surged back and Scott put them ahead for good —52-49 — with a no-hesitation, high-arcing three.
Never mind that at that point she was 0-for-4 from long range.
“I was trailing the play, but I knew Abbie (Riddle) was going to snap the ball back to me. She always finds me. She’s a great passer,” Scott said. “I knew it was the right shot to take in that moment. I had pure confidence when it was going up and then it dropped in.”
She said earlier in the year the team would likely not have been able to mount a comeback like that:
“We’ve grown a lot. We’ve shown some maturity as a group. You saw that in the fourth quarter. We didn’t have a turnover and held them to single-digit (9) scoring.”
In that final quarter, Scott led WSU with seven points.
Wednesday was the Raiders annual Pink Game, a breast cancer awareness effort for which the team wore new white uniforms trimmed with pink. They’re usually worn just one game a year and eventually are auctioned off to raise funds for cancer work.
As she looked at her new threads, Scott had a thought:
“I loved these tonight. With the pink, I think they looked very sharp and we played well at the end. I think we should wear then again, maybe for the last game here. They could bring us luck again.”
At that moment you could almost hear Stevie Wonder in the background.
It seemed like another superstition was in the making.
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