Pepperdine Freshman Guard McDaniel Gives It Her Best Shot : Basketball: She is impressing coaches with her accuracy from three-point range and leads the Waves in scoring.

You wouldn’t know it from her 50% shooting from three-point range, but Pepperdine freshman point guard Aimee McDaniel is battling a bad back and tendinitis in a knee.

You wouldn’t know it from McDaniel either. She is a fighter, not the sort of player to make alibis.

McDaniel said in a recent interview that she took last summer off from playing basketball so that she could work part time, go to the beach and catch up on her favorite soaps on television.

She said nothing about taking a break from basketball because her back was bothering her, nothing about the herniated disc that caused such pain that she was forced to miss the first three weeks of practice this fall.

But Wave Coach Ron Fortner said it for her.

“She is very mature,” he said. “She doesn’t like to make excuses; she’s a great competitor. She does not like sitting out, but, if I see her favoring her (back or legs) in practice, I’ll sit her out.”

Fortner said that McDaniel had the back problem in high school, but Pepperdine team physicians feel that surgery won’t be necessary. Instead, exercises have been prescribed to correct the problem.

“One of her discs is slightly out of alignment,” he said. “Every time she would arch her back it would pinch the nerves. (She had) pain going down her leg, but she’s not having any more of those sharp pains, just some soreness.”

The tendinitis is a result of her being kicked in the knee in practice. Fortner said that ailment “is getting better. She is having very little pain now, some days not at all. She may have a flare-up after two hard games.”

McDaniel, who led Brea Olinda High to the state championship in her junior season and the state final as a senior, is making the transition to the college game.

She is averaging a team-high 15.5 points a game, a notch ahead of junior forward Shannon Frowiss, who is averaging 15.4. McDaniel scored a career-high 25 points in a victory over Southwest Missouri State and also leads the Waves with an average of 4.3 assists. She has made 15 of 30 three-point attempts.

“If it’s open, I’ll take it,” she said. The three-point basket “was brought in when I was a sophomore in high school. My coach (Mark Trakh) started working with me on it, and it became my strongest shot. I owe a lot to (Trakh); he taught me everything I know.”

She has not been as strong on two-point attempts; she is shooting only 38.8% from the field. Fortner said that her inaccuracy overall on field goals is largely a result of her attempts to “drive and penetrate and shoot layups. She probably has to learn to be a little more selective.”

McDaniel agrees with her coach. She said that she sometimes has shooting problems because the college game is a lot rougher than high school basketball.

“I feel rushed on shots because I feel that they’re going to get blocked,” she said. “It’s a mental thing, but I have to get physically tougher. I think that once I get the experience, I’ll be not just physically tougher, but I may be able to outthink or outrun” opposing players.

“It’s a lot different from high school with the pressure defenses. I’m surprised that the referees let a lot of things go (instead of calling personal fouls), but I don’t mind.”

Fortner doesn’t mind if McDaniel makes a few mistakes because he thinks she will learn from them. He said that the Waves haven’t had a true point guard in several years and that he plans to give McDaniel plenty of leeway.

Fortner said that he began watching McDaniel when she was a freshman in high school and recruited her with the hope that she was going to be his point guard for four seasons, regardless of any mistakes she may make in the process of adjusting to college basketball.

“She is taking a beating physically and mentally, but I think you’re going to see that she will be a lot better at the position than she is already,” Fortner said.

One of the problems McDaniel will have to overcome, Fortner said, is that she is not as quick as she should be.

“Her quickness is not up to (NCAA) Division I levels,” he said. “She can’t go by people.”

To improve her quickness, Fortner will have McDaniel doing more weight training in the summer to strengthen her leg muscles.

McDaniel, who was named the CIF-Southern Section 3-A Division player of the year last season, realizes she must work on her game, although she was regarded as one of the nation’s top prep point guards.

“I’m not going to be satisfied with what I was in high school; that is the past,” she said.

Specifically, McDaniel said she has to improve her defense, her ability to dribble against a full-court press, at seeing plays develop and even at her outside shooting.

Injuries to McDaniel, Frowiss and 6-5 senior center Sharon Wilson, among others, have kept Pepperdine (3-5) from improving as a team. Frowiss is recovering from torn tendons in her back. Wilson dislocated a shoulder in a Nov. 30 game and is expected to return by the end of the month.

Fortner said that the injuries have been a handicap and that he has had to rely more and more on McDaniel for leadership.

He said that he knew long ago that McDaniel has what it takes to be a leader. He said he once saw her get knocked down by an opponent in a summer league game, but she got up and hit a three-point shot.

“She knows what you’re going to talk about before you talk to her,” Fortner said. “She never has any excuses or buts. This is a real good kid.”