When senior captain Michela North stepped up to the foul line on Jan. 28 to shoot for point number 1,423 of her Tufts career, there was a sense of déjà-vu that filled the two-time all-NESCAC selection. She realized that she could break the record, which at the time stood at 1,422, anytime during that game.
“In high school when I scored my 1000th point it was on a foul shot as well, but I missed the first one – and I was thinking this was going to be a repeat,” she said.
Thankfully for North, she made that shot to become Tufts' all-time leading scorer. North also currently holds the record for the most rebounds of all time.
Coach Carla Berube praised North for her record-breaking shot.
'“Make the next free throw’ – that was my immediate thought [after she broke the record],” Berube joked. "I was just really happy for her. It’s not only a great accomplishment for her, but I’m sure her teammates are really proud of her."
She also noted that North had big shoes to fill.
"I’m proud of her too thinking of who she surpassed – [2011 graduate] Colleen Hart was a tremendous basketball player and leader here," Berube said. "To think that Michela has taken over her record is pretty special. And she probably knows my thoughts – 'Let’s make the next free throw, let’s go, we can celebrate this after.'”
But North's status as a Tufts basketball star would not have been possible if the Duxbury, Mass. native had stuck with her original desire to study outside of New England. North grew up in an athletic family: Her father played football at the University of New Hampshire, while her mother played three sports, including basketball, at Tufts. She discovered her passion for basketball while playing with her older brother in their driveway back home.
When the time came to pick colleges, however, she found herself drawn to the familiarity of Tufts.
“When I was looking for schools, I kind of said no way to Tufts – my whole family’s gone there, it’s too familiar, I want to get out of the local area, have something new,” North said. “But when I finally visited with the team here, I just felt really connected to the girls – it felt like they were a close-knit family which I hadn’t gotten with a lot of other teams. And I found that I actually really liked the feeling of being close to home ... [and] knowing that my mom’s stayed in the dorms that I was going to live in. So that kind of stuff was just really cool to me.”
Berube, having coached the team for close to 15 years, is proud of the commitment and dedication that North has shown over the years to the team, on and off the court.
“They call her sort of a grandma, because she’s older and wiser and always in the training room with different nagging injuries, which happens to people who’ve been in the program and have been playing so long," Berube said. "She’s just really elevated her game since freshman year -- her strength, her moves. It’s been fun watching her go from a young deer in the headlights to a confident, strong woman and basketball player.”
First-year forward/guard Erica DeCandido expressed respect for North and gratitude for the advice and support that her teammate has offered her.
“I’ve never played post much – but she’s one of those people I look up to,” DeCandido said. “She knows how to score, she knows how to get things done. If I’m having trouble with a play or with just understanding things, she’ll help me out. One time she pulled me aside and walked me through the plays because she thought I wasn’t getting the post down very well ... But that’s just her character, she wants to succeed."
According to DeCandido, North has also created a friendly atmosphere conducive to a successful team.
“In practice, she works hard,” DeCandido said. “She’s a good leader. She really tries to push everyone on the team … most of the time, she’s always smiling. It’s weird, if she makes a mistake, she'll just smile about it. It’s kind of good to see as a freshman that mistakes are just stuff you have to brush off.”
North attributed her leadership abilities to the team ethos that she has been exposed to since her first day.
“Coming in as a freshman, you never know if you’re going to get any playing time," she said. "I think just listening to the captains at that time and everyone above me, taking advice from them, learning from what they do and how they interact and encourage the other players every single year, taking a page out of their book ... [As I was] going into my junior year, [I went in] with more court experience, stepping up into that role and knowing that I have to be there for my teammates because they’re the ones looking up to me now."
Berube said she was particularly proud of North during the University of Scranton game last year that sealed Tufts’ NCAA tournament quarterfinal victory.
“She was just awesome on both ends of the floor,” Berube said. “It was a packed house at Scranton, they were undefeated, they had all the momentum and we came in and needed Michela to stay out of foul trouble, to play their post player the way she did. She did it and then some.”
Yet for all of her success – 110 victories, prior to tonight’s rescheduled match at home against Rhode Island College – the eleven defeats she has experienced as a Tufts player continue to rankle, none more so than the two times the team lost to Thomas More, first at the NCAA Semifinals and then in the Championship game last year.
Those defeats, North said, make her want to fight even harder.
“I wanted [nothing more] than to go back and just restart that game,” North said. “One of the hardest things is having the regrets of every single play … I find myself in class replaying every single play that went on."
Nonetheless, she emphasized the importance of focusing on improving.
"You can’t go back and change the game, but you can look forward, get in the gym and get better each day," North said. "Coming into this year as a senior, this is my last shot. It’s kind of all or nothing, no regrets, go as hard as you can in everything that you do ... I think that’s not just the seniors’ mentality, but [the whole team's] mentality this year."
Michela sets the bar far North of expectations
