Picton earns rookie of the year honours
Like father, like daughter.
Thirty years after Dave Picton was named the Ontario University Athletics West Rookie of the Year Award playing for Brock, Maddie Picton received the same honour as a member of the Western Mustangs.
“It was cool to see that all my hard work ended up paying off and I saw some results,” Maddie said Wednesday night, after her team lost 77-58 to Brock in the OUA West championship game. “It is always good to see success early on in your career.”
The 5-foot-6 guard averaged 12.6 points, 3.2 rebounds and 27.2 minutes of playing time per game to earn top rookie, Second Team All-Star and All-Rookie Team honours.
The 19-year-old Welland native felt the biggest stride she made in her rookie season was adapting to the physicality of OUA ball.
“I am one who is really fast-paced and I like to get up and run and get going but I didn’t fully realize how strong this league was,” the kinesiology major said. “When you play against people who are six years older than you sometimes, it was ‘like whoa.’ It was adapting to how I was going to be able to manage to score and help my team out.”
Picton had plenty of training for OUA ball. She played fearlessly and got knocked around plenty in Ontario Scholastic Basketball Association play with Niagara Prep.
“One thing I am really good at is reading the play and taking charges. That adds to my game and makes my level of physicality stronger. It is also harder to read because people don’t know how I am going to cover them.”
The next step in her progression is becoming more consistent.
“I want to work on my consistency in the mid-range and on the three-point line along with being more shifty and adding different levels of speed and being harder to guard. I am going to work a lot in the off-season on changing pace.”
Like all her rookie class, Picton had to deal with her first season being canceled by the COVID pandemic.
“I realized I was going to be battling and I realized playing against first- and second-year players was going to be difficult. I thought if I went in there with the mentality of making my team better and myself better I would see success.”
Picton came to the conclusion she belonged in the league during a 61-58 victory over Lakehead on Nov. 26.
“I made some free throws to win the game and I realized this league is for me and I was happy where I was and happy that I chose Western. The sky’s the limit and the harder I work at the game the better I will become.”
Picton feels she has the mentality to succeed.
“I am never satisfied, I am very determined and I come from a very determined family. I am hard on myself and I know that just because the season is over I still have to put in the hard work.”
Picton’s rookie season wasn’t all fun and games. She had to miss a number of games because of a compression fracture in her ankle.
“It was not going to get better if I played through it and got therapy so I took a couple of games off. It got to the point where I couldn’t even walk and any jump off the floor I couldn’t land on my foot. That hurt and I never want to be on the sidelines again.”
Picton’s season came to an end with the loss to Brock. A win would have qualified Western for nationals.
“It is what it is and at this point we are a young team,” she said. “Brock had an amazing game and it was cool to play in my hometown because we never played them in the regular season. It was cool to feel it out but Brock’s atmosphere was definitely hard to play in.”
Picton had a team-high 14 points in the game.
