Shooting Stars East Valley Athletes Provide Stellar Performances For Knight Basketball Squad
One East Valley athlete has been a Star since birth. The other attained stardom over a period of years.
Both have been guiding lights for three seasons of Knight basketball.
Star Olson is a record-setting long- and triple-jumper for EV’s track team and is one of the basketball team’s leading scorers. As her name might imply, she is a natural athlete.
Her running mate, Linsay Porter, has played basketball since she can remember. She’s the Knight assist and steals leader at point guard and also became one of the school’s better soccer players.
They are part of a trio of third-year starters - Farrah Parsley is the other - who have been working toward a state tournament appearance since eighth grade.
“Linsay’s by far our most competitive player. We need her in the game,” said first-year coach Darsi Frazier. “Star has the most raw athletic ability.”
Olson said that while on a walk and pregnant with her first child her mother Vicki saw a shooting star and thought Star would be a good name.
Little did she realize the appropriateness of her decision. Since her sophomore year, Olson has been the Frontier League’s reigning horizontal jump champion and three-time state placer.
She set a league record of 36 feet in the triple jump and school record 17-2 in the long jump. Her goals this spring are to add a foot to each.
“I’ve done basketball a lot more than track,” said Olson. “In junior high, Mrs. (Julie) Scott said I should try out. I didn’t like it.”
She was talked into it again by high school coaches Glenn Gunderson and Shane Toy.
“I was pretty fast running. I think they saw that,” Olson continued. “I did good and stuck with it.”
Olson didn’t have the impact of Porter their sophomore year in basketball, but by last season averaged 14 points per game. So far this year she’s scoring at a similar clip for the 7-7 Knights.
“I’ve actually been hitting more outside shots than usual,” said Olson. “The coach and my mother say, ‘Everyone knows you drive. You’ve got to fool them.”’
Porter, whose brother Dobie played three years for the EV boys team before graduating in 1992, moved here in grade school from Ione, Wash.
“I played ever since I was little, little, watching my brother begin in Bitty Ball,” she said.
It wasn’t until high school, when she realized she didn’t have a volleyball future, that she also turned to soccer and became a starter on a perennial playoff team.
“A friend talked me into it,” she said. “I wish I’d played it when I was younger. It’s just like basketball only you use your feet.”
The starting point guard for three years, she actually averaged more points per game as a sophomore than the following two.
“My role is to run everything and make sure it goes well,” said Porter. “I like to assist better than score.”
Her coach, however, would like her to score more.
Frazier took over an experienced team but one whose best previous record with Olson and Porter in the lineup was 5-15.
“Anytime (you don’t win) you’re dealing with baggage,” said Frazier. “We knew we weren’t going to be 20-0 but our goal is to be at .500 or above.”
The playoff potential is there, even if the Knights were 2-4 going into Friday night’s game at West Valley.
Parsley, said Frasier, is capable of scoring 25 points a game. The Knights have size and experience if not a lot of depth. They have the outside duo of Porter and Olson.
And comparative scores indicate there isn’t much difference between unbeaten leader Cheney or EV which lost by just a basket to the Blackhawks.
“We’re right there with everyone,” said Olson. “We feel like it’s our job as captains go keep the team going and make them believe we can do this.”
With a pair of stars in the lineup, EV is on the right track.
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