By JOE WALLJASPER, Columbia Tribune, August 3, 2007 The name, Jackie Stiles, hits your ears like a familiar song that you haven’t heard in years. Jackie Stiles. Whatever happened to her? It was six years ago that Stiles made the leap from athlete to American icon. She looked normal enough - a 5-foot-8 small-town girl from Kansas - but when she got on the basketball court, she was everywhere at once, scoring absurd amounts with jump shots and moves that defied defenses designed specifically to stop her. She had shunned the scholarship offers of national powers such as Connecticut to play at Southwest Missouri State, which just felt a little more like home to her. She became the leading scorer in women’s college basketball history with 3,393 points. Those who made her out to be an unathletic overachiever were giving in to racial stereotypes - she won 15 gold medals at state track meets in high school - but there was no denying her wondrous skills were the result of a fanatical work ethic. She was the kind of player who prompted parents to point at the television and elbow their daughter, or son, and say, "See what happens when you put in the effort." In 2001, many of us did watch as Stiles led the Bears on an improbable journey to the Final Four in St. Louis. She scored 41 points in an upset of top-seeded Duke in the Sweet 16 then poured in 32 as SMS advanced to the Final Four. One of her favorite memories is when the team arrived back in Springfield after that game. "We get off the plane, and it’s pandemonium," said Stiles, who was a guest speaker at the MSHSAA Sportsmanship Summit yesterday at the Holiday Inn Select. "It’s wall-to-wall people. It took us three hours to get through a 10-gate airport." That adulation ramped up in St. Louis. At an autograph session, Stiles recalled seeing a throng of fans fighting for position in front of the Bears while the nearby UConn Huskies sat virtually ignored. "We would sign an autograph for girls and they would start crying," Stiles said. "It was crazy." When Stiles recalls the events of that year, she says, "it’s almost seems like a whole separate life." In a way, that’s true. After one successful year with the WNBA’s Portland Fire in which she was named the league’s rookie of the year, Stiles’ body betrayed her. She missed 11 games in 2002. The Fire folded that year, and Stiles was claimed by the Los Angeles Sparks, but she never played another game. Over the next three years, she had 13 surgeries - five on her right ankle, three on her right shoulder, three on her right wrist and two on her right Achilles’ tendon. Unfortunately, she wasn’t left-handed. "All my injuries were caused by overuse, basically," Stiles said. "I didn’t have any injuries where I planted wrong. It was all just wear and tear over time." Her work ethic, which fueled her basketball greatness, shortened her playing career. Stiles couldn’t even play pick-up games during those three years. Last November, she decided to make one last go of it, signing with the Canberra Capitals of Australia’s WNBL. It was a sort of David Beckham arrangement, and she was hustled onto the court despite some nagging knee pains. She broke a rib in her seventh minute of her first game. After sitting out five weeks, she enjoyed one last Jackie Stiles moment in her first practice with the team. Every shot she took went in the basket, and she buzzed around her puzzled teammates as if the league championship depended on the practice. Afterward, she was ecstatic. "I call everybody in the middle of the night, their time, and tell them, ‘I can do this. I can make a comeback,’ " she said. The next day, she couldn’t walk. Her knee was a swollen mess. "The doctor said, ‘It’s the worst case of tendonitis I’ve ever seen. I’m not going to let you play on this. You need surgery,’ " Stiles said. "I was like, OK, it’s time. It was a lot of work to have one seven-minute game and one practice, but it gave me the clarity that now I can put it down and know I gave it everything I had and it just wasn’t meant to be." She tells her tale with no trace of bitterness, just some nostalgia and an admission that the transition from hero to regular person was - and continues to be - difficult. When she went apartment hunting in Wichita, Kan., she thought her eventual choice was too expensive until she noticed it had a basketball gym where she could give private lessons and avoid trying to schedule court time at local schools. It’s jarring to think of one of the all-time best college basketball players worrying about making the rent or haggling for an open hour at a middle school gymnasium. But that’s real life. "At first it was like I kind of like I lost my identity," Stiles said. "I had put all my eggs in one basket. I’m still trying to adjust and find what I’m passionate about for the next 40 years." It’s hard to recount the events of Stiles’ life after college graduation without making it sound like a pity party, but that’s not the way she comes across. She tells her tales good-naturedly, as if this is the first time she’s told them and not the thousandth. She is staying involved in basketball by giving lessons and clinics. She recently shot some instructional videos. She is embarking on a side career as a public speaker, hence yesterday’s appearance at the sportsmanship summit. So that’s what has happened to Jackie Stiles, and no need to make it a tragedy. She has plenty of memories to make her smile. Unless she’s near her hometown of Claflin, Kan., or in Springfield, where her sister now plays for the Bears, Stiles doesn’t get recognized much. But when she hands a cashier her credit card, their eyes often flicker with recognition. "They’ll say, ‘Hey, I remember you.’ "