Running with the big Dawg

Published 12:01 am Saturday, February 5, 2011

SEATTLE — Thursday night made all the hard work worthwhile.

The summer sprints. The low-fat meals. The long sessions on the stationary bike.

For Regina Rogers, the months of dedication she put in to get in shape had a delayed reward. A hamstring injury set the University of Washi

ngton women’s basketball player back a few weeks, so it took a little time to reap the benefits of her offseason work.

And then on Thursday night, about 13 months after she had watched a game against Oregon from the bench because she couldn’t keep up with the fast pace, Rogers was practically the last one standing. The 6-foot-3 junior outworked everyone on the floor in overtime of a 90-76 win over the Ducks.

Afterward, Rogers was asked whether she would have had enough left in the tank for a second overtime. Sheepishly, and with no sign of exhaustion, she nodded and said: “Yeah.”

Rogers didn’t perform like she was pushing for another extra session. She scored eight of UW’s 16 points in the overtime period, including three field goals in a span of less than a minute to put the game out of reach.

She finished with 18 points to match a season high.

“It just talks about her maturity level,” coach Tia Jackson said after Thursday’s game. “She’s a kid who understands the commitment that it takes to play the kind of basketball we want to play. … She maximizes her minutes, and (Thursday) she exceeded the max. She was awesome.”

Had the game been played last season, Rogers probably wouldn’t have been available for the extra session. Foul trouble and a lack of conditioning limited her to 17.1 minutes per game, and there were nights — like the game in Eugene last January — when Rogers had to sit down because she simply couldn’t keep up with the pace.

“It’s always hard when you have to sit and watch a game,” said Rogers, who played just five minutes in Eugene on Jan. 1, 2010.

A dedication to getting in shape motivated Rogers throughout the offseason, and teammates helped push her through the grueling workouts.

“My team, this summer, they said: ‘We really need you to get in shape,’” Rogers said. “A lot of times, they were right beside me (working out). If I was last, I had Kristi (Kingma) right there running with me, coaching me through it. And it really helped me.”

Rogers also altered her diet in an effort to get into better shape, losing 25 pounds in the process. The Seattle native, who has often described her body type as matching that of father and former NFL defensive lineman Reggie Rogers, came into the season in the best shape of her life.

But hamstring problems derailed the start to her season, and Rogers ended up missing 10 games. She returned to the floor on Jan. 6 and has thrived in a new role coming off the bench so as to maintain her effectiveness when in the game.

Rogers has scored in double figures in three of the past four games. Jackson has said that having a healthy Rogers has helped complete the Huskies’ offensive attack, and the 3-2 record over the past five games has backed that up. After two consecutive wins, UW (9-10 overall, 4-6 in the Pac-10) has gone from ninth to sixth place in the conference and sits just two games behind third-place California.

“This team, they are just so resilient,” Jackson said Thursday night.

Thursday’s game marked the first time this season that the Huskies had five players in double figures, providing further proof that the healthier Huskies might have enough offensive firepower to get on a run.

“I feel like we’re showing what Husky basketball is,” Rogers said. “We’re becoming a team. We had to find out identity, and I think we’re finally doing that.”