Point of reference. If you are planning to make a pilgrimage to Springfield, remember this. There are four or five different ways to get there. None of the roads are any good. At one time, I guess, there was a proposal in the legislature to build a four-lane highway to Springfield. I don’t know this for a fact. Here is a message for our lawmakers. A four-lane to Springfield is needed. Thank you.

Now back to our story. Despite a 6 1/2 minute scoring drought in the first half, the Lady Bears rolled to a 102-46 victory over Bradley in a Missouri Valley Conference game. Jackie Stiles scored 18 hard-fought points.

SMS has at least two famous alums--actress Kathleen Turner (Body Heat, War of the Roses, Romancing the Stone, Jewel of the Nile) and John Goodman (Roseanne, the Babe, Blues Brothers 2000). But neither were in attendance. However, 9,021 other people did pay to watch the Lady Bears play Saturday night--the sixth-largest crowd in school history for a women’s game. The place only seats 8,846. They must have been sitting in the rafters.

How does the hometown girl from little ol’ Claflin react in front of 9,000 hootin’ and hollerin’ fans? You can fit about 12 Claflins inside the Hammons Center. "I don’t think anyone can concentrate when they come in here and play," said Jackie about opposing teams, who have to not only deal with the crowd, but the SMS Lady Bear Band, an energetic mascot and a student section seated right behind the opposing free throw line in the second half. One of the students’ routines consists of turning around and "shaking their booties" when the other team is at the foul line. "It’s a great feeling," Jackie said. "I can’t explain the feeling. That makes all the hard work worth it." They take their women’s basketball very seriously in Springfield. It’s not just a game--it’s almost a religious experience.

By comparison, the SMS men’s team played a home Saturday afternoon, and drew only 7,721 fans. The Bears defeated Indiana State 74-56.

Claflin’s favorite daughter Jackie Stiles kind of had a quiet first half Saturday night against the Bradley Braves. She scored 9 points, including a pair of breakaway layups. But she spent most of the first half carrying an extra 120 pounds around with her. Everywhere she went, Bradley’s Heather Best, a 6-foot junior guard, was in her hip pocket and tugging at her shirt. Just Jackie and her shadow. But that’s what Jackie Stiles faces now from opposing teams. She’s a marked person. President Clinton might be the only other person in America who gets more attention (unfortunately for him it’s for all the wrong reasons).

Jackie managed to get off just one long-range shot during the first 20 minutes. The Bears, ranked 24th in the USA Today/ESPN poll and 25th in the Associated Press poll, still pulled out to a 39-29 halftime lead thanks to 11 points and 8 rebounds from former Kansas City Washington standout Roshonda Reed. Jackie also picked up her second foul with about 5 minutes left in the first half. SMS coach Cheryl Burnett has a "two-foul rule." Any player who gets two fouls in the first half usually finds a seat on the bench--Burnett doesn’t want players to foul out.

"When Jackie gets the ball, she gets a lot of attention," understated Burnett during her postgame interview. Stiles had regained the Missouri Valley scoring lead with her 29-point performance in Thursday’s 94-59 win at home over Northern Iowa. She is now averaging 20.1 points a game (363 points in 18 games).

But, hours after the game while eating a late-night dinner with her mom Pam and about a dozen other friends and family members (Pam was in town to watch Jackie score 29 points in a win Thursday and stayed over--Pat Stiles was back home in Claflin because of a basketball tournament), Jackie revealed the real reason she was taken out. Burnett wanted to do some coaching--even stars need life lessons occasionally. Burnett told Jackie that she needed to set some screens if she wanted to get open for her shots. Ah the life of a freshman. They are still on the bottom rung of the food chain in college.

The Kansas men’s basketball team has a tradition--the freshmen have to carry the bags and load the bus. The only good thing about your freshman year is that you become a sophomore the next year.

Jackie later divulged that she was suffering from three minor maladies: the tendinitis in her knee, a deep thigh bruise and a sore Achilles tendon. The thigh bruise alsmost kept her out of the game, but Jackie’s a trooper. There was no way some silly little injury was going to keep Jackie out of the game. Jackie scored 9 more points in the second half, including a couple nice moves in the lane and a couple breakaway layups. She made 6-of-14 field goal attempts, and uncharacteristically missed two of her eight free throws.

The Lady Bears outscored Bradley 63-17 in the second half, smashing a few records along the way. Jackie’s teammate Jamie Bartlett came off the bench to fire in six 3-pointers. She missed her first four trey attempts, but made six of her last eight. Bartlett scored 20 points, Reed ended up with 13 points and 12 rebounds, 5-2 point guard Yen Quach scored 16 and Lisa Davies tallied 14. Bartlett shrugged off her slow start. "I was getting warmed up (after missing her first four shots)," said the 5-9 junior guard from Siloam Springs, Ark. "I felt a lot of confidence. I figure out that I was too close (on her first few attempts) because they were bouncing out long. So I stepped back."

I was fortunate and privileged enough to be able to interview Jackie exclusively for about 15 minutes after the game. Assistant sports information director Brand Hainje, Springfield News-Leader sports writer Larry Hazelrigg and Steve Koehler, who strung the story for AP, were more than courteous. Jackie is, and will always be, her toughest critic.

After scoring 3,603 points in her high school career and 361 in her brief college career, she’s still looking for the perfect game. She was still searching for it Saturday night. "I struggled a lot offensively," said Jackie, who wants her to team to succeed. "It was fun to see our team play like it did tonight. It doesn’t matter what I do individually--it’s how the team does. In our system, coach Burnett says our defense sets up our offense. We made it an up-tempo game. Our main focus in practice is defense."

The Lady Bears improved to 15-3 overall and 7-3 in the Missouri Valley. SMS has a rematch Thursday against Drake at Des Moines, Iowa. Drake, 14-3 overall and 9-0 in Valley play before a Sunday game against Creighton, handed SMS its first loss of the season.

On Feb. 14, SMS has a rematch (revenge match, grudge match) against the Wichita State Shockers--the team that sort of spoiled Jackie’s 39-point homecoming night back on Jan. 17 in Wichita. But this time, it’s put up or shut up time for the Shockers because the second time is at SMS. And Jackie said the Bears will be ready for the Shockers. "I’m so excited to play Wichita State again," Jackie said. "It was devastating for me to go home again and have us lose that game. Anyone who beats us, we’re thankful for the opportunity to play them again. We hate to lose."