Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, March 2, 1991 TAG: 9103020145
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DOUG DOUGHTY SPORTSWRITER
DATELINE: CHARLOTTESVILLE LENGTH: Long
All Tonya Cardoza has done for most of the season is lead UVa in scoring and rebounding.
Tammi Reiss has taken over the team scoring lead, 428-426, but Cardoza had the satisfaction this week of being named first-team All-ACC for the second time.
Cardoza was not a repeat selection, however, having missed the 1989-90 season while on academic probation.
Last spring, while UVa was making its first appearance in the Final Four, Cardoza was home in Roxbury, Mass., working as a receptionist at Northeastern University.
"I was disappointed I was not there with them," said Cardoza, a 5-foot-10 forward, "but it was good to see them do so well. I know a lot of people doubted them. I was relieved, actually, because at first I thought I had let them down."
There are those who would argue that the Cavaliers could have won the NCAA championship if Cardoza had been eligible.
On the other hand, it's unlikely UVa would have been as good this year without her.
"I think it was for the best," said Cardoza, a fifth-year senior. "This is a much more mature team than the one I left. It's more of a close-knit group. Two years ago, there were a lot of little cliques and jealousies."
The Cavaliers were 21-10 in 1988-89, but lost five of their last eight games, including an 80-47 blowout at Tennessee. Nonetheless, Cardoza never considered not returning.
"I wanted to be different from a lot of other people who are suspended and never come back," Cardoza said. "There was never any question that I would come back."
Cardoza applied for reinstatement for the second semester last year and was turned down, but that was no major setback. She would not have played basketball at UVa anyway.
Instead, Cardoza would get off work in the afternoon and head for the Shelburne Rec Center near her home, where she would work on her outside shooting until enough players - mostly men - would arrive for pick-up games.
Cardoza not only maintained her competitive edge, but she extended her shooting range to the 3-point line.
She made one 3-point shot in her career before this season, but is 20-of-42 this year and would be leading the ACC in 3-point percentage (.476) if she had enough attempts to qualify.
"A lot of coaches around the league, when they go over the scouting report, I'm sure they say I'm strictly a penetrator," Cardoza said. "It's [the 3-pointer] just something I decided to add to my game. I think I always had it in me, but it was always so much easier for me to drive."
Cardoza always was a multidimensional player who had jumping ability to battle taller players for rebounds and the ball-handling skills to play on the perimeter. It was Cardoza's steal and layup in the closing seconds of triple overtime that lifted the top-ranked Cavaliers (26-1) past North Carolina State 123-120 in what Duke coach Debbie Leonard has called "the game of the century."
"It was a huge, huge play," UVa coach Debbie Ryan said, "not only the steal, but then to get down the floor so quickly with so little time on the clock. I think she's a very underrated player, maybe not with the coaches, but in the media."
Cardoza was a Parade All-American at Cambridge Rindge and Latin, alma mater of New York Knicks and ex-Georgetown star Patrick Ewing. She ranks fifth on UVa's career scoring list, fifth in rebounds, 10th in assists, second in steals and first in blocked shots - with a chance to move up significantly in all categories but the last one.
The only disappointment has been the year's academic probation.
"I'm a procrastinator," Cardoza said. "I like to goof off until the last minute, but I'm not the kind of person who can wait until the last minute to make good grades."
Cardoza will be 12 hours short of graduation and plans to return next fall to get her degree. Then, she hopes to play professionally overseas.
Cardoza's ears turn deaf at talk of the new women's professional league with 9-foot-2 baskets and 80-foot courts.
"I don't think I'd ever want to do that," Cardoza said. "I think it's degrading to women because it says we're not capable of playing on the regulation, 10-foot baskets. I think our game's just as exciting as the men's; it's just that we're not able to dunk consistently."
Cardoza said she can dunk anything she can palm, but her hands are too small to grip a basketball.
"If the baskets were 9-8, I think you'd still see some dunking," Cardoza said. "But to put the baskets at 9-2 is to say we're really not that exciting."
Cardoza thinks the first N.C. State game, attended by more than 11,000 fans in Raleigh, N.C., proves otherwise. UVa had a home sellout for the rematch with State.
"I think that [first] game is probably the greatest game I've ever been a part of," Cardoza said. "The best part was that people would actually come out to see women's basketball and that you didn't need to lower the rims to 9-2 for people to watch us."
Keywords:
PROFILE BASKETBALL
by CNB