NWC’s Rachel Bozlee has shooting touch that inspires awe

Rachel Bozlee is the best basketball player that few people have heard of in the Spokane area.
She may just be the best basketball player in the region as it is.
At the very least, an argument could be made that Bozlee is the best senior in the area.
What sets the Northwest Christian standout apart from her peers is her shooting.
“Rachel has one of the prettiest, smoothest, natural shots in all my 40 years of coaching,” said Spokane Sandpipers club coach Kerry Pickett. “She can flat shoot.”
Another longtime area club coach, Spokane Stars director Ron Adams, agrees. He helped mold Bozlee’s touch as her shooting coach for four years.
“She’s a zone breaker,” Adams said. “She’s the quiet assassin. If she makes her first 3, you better pray she gets in foul trouble.”
The 5-foot-8 Bozlee doesn’t toe the 3-point arc – which extends 19 feet, 9 inches from the basket.
“She can make them from deep,” Adams said. “She can make them from NBA range.”
As a junior, Bozlee made a school record 91 3-pointers. She also set the single-game record last year when she made nine in a district game.
Born in Coeur d’Alene, Bozlee and her family moved to the Mead area when she was in fourth grade so her dad could be closer to his job and she would be closer to her AAU team.
One of Bozlee’s club coaches, John Graham, who coaches Spokane Legacy, once told Bozlee she needed to give up trying to be a point guard.
“He told me I’d never be a point guard in college, that if I wanted to play in college I needed to work on my shot,” Bozlee said.
So she went to work.
“When I worked on being a shooter, it just sort of flowed,” she said.
Two years ago, Bozlee sent a recruiting video to Azusa Pacific coach T.J. Hardeman. He made a point to watch her at a couple of summer tournaments.
That prompted an offer. Bozlee gave an oral commitment a year ago and signed with the NCAA Division II school in November.
Pickett knows Bozlee could have received Division I offers. But she says the school near Los Angeles was the perfect place for her.
“The fact that it’s a Christian school and the coach is a Christian made an impact on me,” Bozlee said. “I wanted to go to a Division II school. I didn’t want to go to a small school and didn’t want to go to a big school. Basketball can seem like a job at a Division I school. I want to enjoy the college experience and get my education paid for.”
Hardeman is tickled to have landed Bozlee.
“She was one of the best shooters I saw while recruiting,” Hardeman said. “We’re pretty uptempo and we like to shoot deep (3s) and she can do that. She was recruited by a lot of good schools. We think we got a steal.”
Pickett and NWC coach Talara Frost challenged Bozlee to work on other aspects of her game.
Said Pickett: “Rachel understood she needed to add things to her game in order to be a successful college player.”
“She’s definitely stepped up,” Frost said. “She’s become one of our better defenders and I wouldn’t have said that about her two years ago.”
Bozlee said she’s worked on shooting off the dribble and coming off of screens.
She’s averaging 21.3 points – tops in the region regardless of classification. She’s also grabbing 6.5 rebounds and 4.2 steals through NWC’s 6-5 start. Her career 3-point shooting percentage is 40.1, and she scored a career high 35 points earlier this season.
Pickett has no doubt the impact Bozlee would have had if she had played in the Greater Spokane League.
“She would have been very successful in the GSL,” Pickett said.
Bozlee has played up with older girls most of her life until this season. Being a leader is something she allowed others to do.
She’s taken to leadership well this year. You can hear it in her voice when she talks about her team.
“I love my team, love my teammates,” she said. “With me being the only returning starter, it’s really a new team. I’ve really had to work at being a leader. It’s been a good challenge.”
She likes her team’s potential.
“We’ve played well and we’re getting used to each other,” she said. “Our best basketball is ahead of us.”