Playing with 7

A team with just seven available players would concern almost any coach.

But not IU women’s basketball coach Felisha Legette-Jack.

Plagued by injuries and other issues, the IU women’s basketball team had to endure a stretch of two weeks with just seven active players.

The Hoosiers (13-14, 6-10) played three games in that span, with home games against Wisconsin and then-No. 4 Ohio State, and a road contest against Illinois. The team went 2-1 in that stretch.

One of those wins came against the conference-leading Buckeyes, a thrilling 67-62 victory in which the Hoosiers held reigning Big Ten Player of the Year Jantel Lavender to three second-half points. Legette-Jack dubbed her healthy players the “sensational seven” after the game.

“These young ladies have been working so hard with so many distractions out there,” she said. “So many things going on with the team and injuries and things of that nature, for us to come together and say, ‘You know what? This day, on this particular day, we will not be denied.’”

The distractions began as early as Jan. 3, when freshman forward Sasha Chaplin, the team’s leading rebounder, suffered a foot injury during a home game against Michigan State.

The injury forced Chaplin to miss the next 10 games and the team to look elsewhere for production off the boards.

That left two Hoosier forwards — junior Hope Elam and sophomore Danilsa Andujar — with the rebounding duties.

Elam, in her first season with IU after transferring from Vincennes, said she wanted to make an impact on the team with Chaplin sidelined. Andujar, who quietly progressed as a contributor until she recorded a career-high 12 rebounds in the win against Ohio State, sought the same impact.

“It’s crucial,” she said. “I feel as though if I can’t do anything else, rebounding is the best thing I can do. So I just have to go hard at it and get as many boards as I can and help us win.”

Even other areas of the team were affected by Chaplin’s injury. Junior guard Whitney Lindsay said the lack of inside presence called for more speed from backcourt players.

“We’ve always been undersized, but definitely with Sasha being out ... we had to be quicker to make up for that height,” she said. “In the Big Ten, the leading scorers are the post players. The quickness has to make up for the lack of height that we have down there.”

However, the front-court injuries didn’t end with Chaplin. Sophomore forward Lindsay Enterline had already been declared out for the season before the Hoosiers’ first game.

In addition, freshman forward Jasmine Davis had been unable to dress for much of the season, leaving IU with one less able body in the post.

Issues even went beyond the realm of injuries.

Sophomore guard Ashlee Mells, who had provided a solid scoring option off the bench, received an indefinite suspension that, coincidentally, lasted the three games during which the team had just seven players.

The situation got so dire that Enterline began sitting on the bench in uniform despite being inactive.

Now, Chaplin, Mells and Davis have all come back, and IU has a full contingent of able players. However, the accomplishments of the reduced roster will not soon be forgotten.

“It makes a statement that we can do all things if we come together, become a team and create that sisterhood,” Legette-Jack said. “No matter what differences you have on the outside, once you cross that line and you come together for the entire time you’re out there, great things can happen.”