SPRINGFIELD -- Many of the three-pointers, driving layups and fade-away jump shots that Jackie Stiles has dropped on her opponents originally found life during the early-morning hours in an empty Hammons Student Center.

Stiles' practice regimen is nothing less than the stuff of folklore.

"You don't need to embellish the stories -- even though people think that we are," senior teammate Carly Deer said. "I have lived with her for four years. She is shooting at 1 a.m. She's practicing her shot every day. She doesn't take a day off. It's unbelievable. Nobody believes it until they see it."

Deer, Melody Campbell and Tara Mitchem first truly understood Stiles' fanaticism for practice during Christmas break of their freshman year at Southwest Missouri State.

Let Campbell tell the tale:

"All of us freshmen get together and we say, `Let's all go out to eat and do something together.' We convince Jackie to go out with us. Jackie hesitantly says OK. She had bought a new pair of jeans and a new top and wanted to wear them somewhere.

"We all get in a truck and she thinks we are only going to eat. Somebody slipped up and said we were going to do something else after dinner.

"She starts yelling, `Let me out of here! Let me out of here! I have not done my shooting, yet!' She's just furious at us because we won't let her out.

"After we get home about midnight, she goes up to the gym, somehow gets in, calls security, who has probably become her best friend and asks to have a light or two turned on so she can get her shooting in.

"That was the marking point for us to say, `My gosh, she's different, she's something else.' "

Stiles smiles when the story is brought up.

"I found somebody who let me in," Stiles said. "I don't want to name names. I don't want them to lose their job.

"If I miss a day, I'd feel guilty. I'd never have that day again to get better and improve."

Stiles has used all that practice time to learn every type of shot.

"One of her greatest qualities is the way she adapts to what people are throwing at her," Deer said. "I really think this year she has all these weapons in her arsenal and she's using them all."

Northern Iowa coach Tony DiCecco knows that as well as anyone. Stiles scored 49 points in a 90-81 victory over his team Jan. 20.

"We did a couple of things to try to slow her down," DiCecco said. "But she is constantly moving without the basketball. She's aware of where her teammates are at and uses her ability to get open to score."

SMS has faced Oklahoma twice this season. Stiles scored 31 against the Sooners in an 89-82 loss on Dec. 1 and two weeks later had 25 in a 69-61 victory.

"She has a great first step," Oklahoma coach Sherri Coale said. "She's outstanding off the dribble. She does an amazing job of getting inside.

"One-on-one, she's as good a player as anybody in the country."

Tennessee coach Pat Summitt noticed Stiles' offensive skill when Stiles came to one of the Vols' summer camps.

"You're not born with the skill or ability to shoot the basketball, you develop it," said Summitt, who recruited Stiles. "Her feet are always set, she's got a beautiful follow-through.

"We watched her play in a camp here, and I thought she had incredible focus. You have to be confident to shoot the basketball the way she does. And she has a lot confidence; when you go against her, it's like you're at her mercy."

Unless, of course, you have her locked in a moving vehicle before she's done her shooting for the day.