Even after ice-cold game, Ruthy Hebard is Division I's top shooter

In her final game with the Oregon Ducks before the holiday break, freshman Ruthy Hebard was colder than a December night back home in Fairbanks. Only two of her 11 shots from the field were good.

And yet she's still the best shooter in women's college basketball.

Hebard, a two-time Class 4A Player of the Year for West Valley, is tearing it up for the Ducks.

Even with her poor shooting performance in Tuesday's 73-70 win over Idaho, Hebard owns the best field goal percentage in Division I — a gaudy 74.7 percent. She has hit 68 of 92 shots and shares the lead in that category with Lanay Montgomery, a senior for West Virginia.

Going into Tuesday's game, Hebard had only missed 15 shots in 11 games and was shooting 81.5 percent from the field (66 of 81).

"She gets it anywhere around the basket, it's one power dribble and she's going up and through people," Oregon coach Kelly Graves told The Oregonian after a game earlier this month.

" … The sky's the limit. You're looking at a real special player there."

[Dimond wins 4A crown despite Hebard's double-double]

Alaska hoop fans have known that for a while.

Hebard, a 6-foot-4 forward, scored 2,227 points for the West Valley Wolfpack. She averaged a double-double in her senior, junior and sophomore seasons.

In high school, Hebard was usually the tallest payer on the court. That's no longer the case, but she has made a smooth, even spectacular, adjustment.

"I didn't have to do all the little things like I have to do now," Hebard told the Portland Tribune last week. "I could just go up and get a rebound. Now I have to box out, and I've gotten stronger."

A true freshman, Hebard averages 13.8 points and 8.7 rebounds. She has already racked up four double-doubles, and she was named the Pac 12's Freshman of the Week on Monday for a three-game stretch last week in which she averaged 21.7 points and 11.3 rebounds.

The biggest game of her brief college career came Saturday against Portland State. She shot 12 of 13 en route to career highs of 28 points and 17 rebounds.

"I'm really disappointed in Ruthy, she missed a shot tonight," Graves said with a laugh in a post-game press conference.

Ranked 40th among the nation's incoming freshmen by ESPNW, Hebard has lived up to her reputation at Oregon, where she's part of a stellar freshman class tabbed by ESPN as the third-best in the nation.

Though they aren't currently ranked, the Ducks were No. 25 earlier this month — their first appearance in the national rankings since 2002.

They dropped out of the rankings after a road loss last week to Ole Miss and are 10-2 heading into the conference season.

"I feel like we can do really big things if we work hard," Hebard told the Portland Tribune. "I saw some of the girls play summer ball, and I wanted to be their teammate."

Hebard spent part of her summer helping USA Basketball's U18 women's team claim the gold medal at the FIBA Americas U18 Women's Basketball Tournament in Chile.

She started the first two games, sat out the third and fourth games with a head injury and came off the bench to register 11 points and seven rebounds in 13 minutes, helping the United States beat Canada 109-62 for the tournament championship.

Hebard and the Ducks start their holiday break Wednesday. They open Pac-12 Conference play Dec. 30 with a home game in Eugene against Washington.