Five 2021 Breakout Scoring Candidates
Up next in our daily season preview articles are the five juniors who I look to have a break out season. The seventh article in a series of 73 highlights the five 2021’s who averaged less than five points a…
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Continue ReadingUp next in our daily season preview articles are the five juniors who I look to have a break out season. The seventh article in a series of 73 highlights the five 2021’s who averaged less than five points a game that I think will be breakout scorers this season. Up next will be the 2020’s but first let’s see those players likely to have a big junior year.
Grace Hardcastle — 5’9 SF — ADM HS — 4.8 PPG last season
Hardcastle really impressed me last year and after a summer of AAU I think that she’s really going to show improvement this upcoming season. She was an able scorer last year but with a total of 18.1 points a game graduating, someone will have to step up. That person will likely be Hardcastle as she was fifth in scoring on the team right behind two seniors. Her ability to hit the jumper is going to be key for her this year but I see no reason she can’t get up to double digits scoring the ball.
Sophie Wittrock — 5’5 PG — Pekin HS — 4.3 PPG last season
Pekin lost their top two scorers who combined for 23.6 points a game last year. They also lost their fifth leading scorer and now need to replace almost 30 points a game. Wittrock is a good candidate to see a big uptick in scoring as long as she continues to be aggressive at looking to score the ball. She is an able scorer but at times last season it looked like her was passive, that should change based on what I saw from her in team camps this past summer.
Macy Gaskill — 5’7 PG — Urbandale HS — 2.5 PPG last season (Featured Image)
Gaskill is in for a big junior year at Urbandale. They are returning both Gyamfi’s, who will very likely be the one-two punch in scoring this upcoming year. That means that there will need to be a third/fourth scoring option and I think with the graduation of point guard DeeDee Pryor (Creighton), Gaskill will fill that role. She might not enter the season as the starting point guard, but from what I continually saw this summer, she’s ready for the spotlight.
Lexi Boles — 6’1 C — Dowling Catholic HS — 2.3 PPG last season
For Dowling, it is inevitable that most of the scoring load is going to be Caitlin Clark, and for good reason. They still need someone to step up and score 8-10 points a game to offset all the attention from the defense that she’ll get. A good candidate for them to come out of nowhere is going to be Boles. She had a solid summer this past year and now that she is comfortable should be able to grab offensive rebounds and score in the paint. I look for Clark to lead the team but I think Boles will be a big contributor.
Jorja Hanselman — 6′ C — Van Meter HS — 2.2 PPG last season
Van Meter loses quite a bit of talent from their team last year with five seniors graduating. Three of those five seniors were in the top five scorers so someone is going to have to step up. I think Hanselman showed the improvement to see a nice scoring jump this season. Maybe not all the way into the double digits but high enough to offset some of the loss. She looked a lot more confident this past summer with the ball in her hands and as her footwork continues to improve so will her scoring ability.