Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, June 12, 1995 TAG: 9506120092
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DWIGHT FOXX STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LAWRENCEVILLE LENGTH: Long
After playing three sports for the fourth year in a row, Linda Bell was entitled to a break. So, what did she do with the free time that came with the end of softball season? She joined the St. Paul's track-and-field squad.
``I did it as a favor to the coach,'' said Bell, who helped St. Paul's form a 4x400 relay team.
Bell's willingness to help did not go unrecognized at the season-ending athletic awards banquet, when she was named track-and-field newcomer of the year, as well as the most valuable player on the women's basketball team.
It was a fitting end to a playing career for Bell, a visionary who could see her basketball potential before there were numbers to support that view.
Her progression from high-school reserve to college standout was almost unreal. In her last two seasons at William Fleming High School, Bell scored 145 points - 85 in her senior year.
Bell had that many points in some weeks at St. Paul's, where she averaged 20.8 points and for 10 weeks led the Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association in scoring before finishing third. Fellow Fleming graduate Marquetta Randolph from Virginia Union was first.
Bell was a senior in high school before she realized she could play college basketball. She remembers traveling to a women's game at Longwood College and thinking the talent level would be overwhelming.
What she saw did not awe her.
``I said to myself, `I can play with them,''' Bell said. ```I know I'm as good as they are.'''
After consulting with Darlene Williams, the volleyball coach at Longwood and a graduate of St. Paul's, Bell decided to attend the rural school with the smallest enrollment in the CIAA, a conference of Division II schools made up of predominantly black institutions.
Bell, a standout in volleyball and softball, was a candidate for a partial scholarship at Longwood before learning she could receive a full scholarship by playing three sports at St. Paul's.
Basketball, the sport she took most seriously, was her weakest early in her college career. In her first two years at St. Paul's, Bell scored fewer than two points per game and it appeared she either should give up the game or resign herself to contributing as a practice player.
``One of the coaches told me that I was a good practice player who couldn't apply it in a game,'' Bell said. ``I said to myself that I could do it. I have this self-motivation that nobody can take from me.''
Her work started to pay off during her junior year, when she averaged 13.7 points and nearly made All-CIAA.
Bell, a 5-foot-5 guard, spent last summer in Roanoke and played pick-up games in Strauss Park and midnight basketball at the old Jefferson High gym, where she sought to perfect her left-handed dribbling. Most of the players were men and Bell needed an element of surprise to get her shot off.
``It's funny; I can't penetrate as well with my right hand as I can my left,'' said Bell, who is right-handed. ``There were only one or two girls in there. A lot of times I would be the only female.''
It must have helped because this year Bell took her game to a new level. She averaged 27.3 points in her first nine games, including a 42-point effort in a win over North Carolina Central and 39 points in a narrow loss to Livingstone.Bell didn't normally pay attention to how many points she was scoring, but she was surprised at her explosion against North Carolina Central.
``I was just happy we won,'' Bell said. ``Some guy at the scorer's table asked me if I knew how many points I had scored. I said, `No.' When he told me that I had scored 42, I said, `What?' I was shocked. I had to see it.''
Bell's development was a revelation to Tonya Kabia, a former Fleming teammate who had transferred from Virginia State to St. Paul's.
``I guess, being a senior, she felt like she had to step up,'' Kabia said. ``So, she did. I've thought about it from time to time: Where is she getting this from? She's so skinny. Skinny, little and she's still shooting.''
Roland Lovelace, the girls' basketball coach at Fleming, felt Bell's best basketball was ahead of her when she left for Lawrenceville. Bell says Lovelace is like a father and she regularly called him with updates on her progress.
Lovelace seemed surprised to hear that Bell had outplayed Randolph in St. Paul's' 57-55 loss to Virginia Union. The game featured five ex-Fleming players: Bell, Kabia, Randolph and Union's Regina Fields and Ashaki Johnson.
``Randolph was a horse,'' Lovelace said. ``I thought she was going Division I. When Linda left, she didn't have as much talent as Randolph. She has used her intelligence to help her become a better player. That's what I like about her; she has her head together.''
St. Paul's finished 3-22 and was last in the CIAA's Northern Division, but Bell was named first-team all-conference. She finished second in the CIAA in 3-point field goals (51) and 3-point percentage (32.5).
Bell served as captain in basketball, volleyball and softball. She had over 350 ``kills'' in her college volleyball career and this year batted .344, with a team-high 39 stolen bases, in softball, prompting sports information director Monique Morgan to dub her, ``the Bell of the ball.'' Bell is a dean's list student as well.
``I had to pass a [statistics] class before I took my comprehensives,'' said Morgan, who has a master's in sports management. ``Linda has tutored me and helped me to understand derivatives and stuff like that. She's always doing something to help somebody out. She's the person you go to when you need to get something done.''
If an offer to play basketball overseas comes up, Bell would consider it. Her immediate plans are to do her student teaching next year, which would complete her undergraduate work, and pursue a master's degree. Eventually, she'd like to coach on the college level.
``I'm the oldest granddaughter,'' Bell said. ``My grandmother, Ethel Whittaker, raised me. No one in the family has ever been to that second tier of education - getting a college degree. I'm going to be the first one.''
Bell moved to Roanoke from Bridgeport, Conn., when she was 11. She told her mother, Mary Green, that she couldn't take the environment of the Bridgeport projects and wanted to get out. Her mother arranged for her to move to Roanoke, where her grandmother raised her and her brother, Henry.
``Her grandmother did a good job of doing for Linda,'' Lovelace said. ``But, Linda said in high school that if she was going to make it, she was going to have to do it herself. And, she's done it.''
by CNB