Southside's Scholtens Wood towered over competition

The Prep Rally: Best in the West series will highlight the all-time best players in western Arkansas as selected by the Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.

Wendy Scholtens Wood's storied basketball career may be long past, but she still stands out in a crowd.

At almost 6-foot-4, that's no surprise. It's been nearly three decades since she dominated opponents on the hardwood, first in high school at Fort Smith Southside and later in college at Vanderbilt.

But the 51-year-old attorney and mother of two jokes about still getting the same stares she got in high school. She gets the usual questions, too.

"I get three questions in this order," Scholtens Wood said. "'How tall are you? Did you play basketball? And how tall is your husband?'"

She's become more patient over the years dealing with the questions about her stature.

"Yeah, as I've got older I've gotten more pleasant with my answers," she said.

Basketball helped her deal with some self-confidence issues she had growing up about her height.

"I was really insecure being 6-3 1/2 and 16 years old," Scholtens Wood said. "Basketball gave me a lot of confidence and made me feel better about the part of me I couldn't change."

There was nothing pleasant for her opponents on the basketball court. The Parade Magazine All-American and three-time all-state selection was nearly unstoppable as she averaged more than 25 points, 10 rebounds and 4.5 blocked shots as a senior in high school, leading the then nicknamed Confederettes to three consecutive state titles, two state Overall crowns and an incredible 95-5 record.

Players that are Scholtens Wood's size, especially in Arkansas, are rare indeed. She recalled Kendall Mago, also listed at 6-4, who played at Mount St. Mary and later at Auburn, as the only other player of her height in the state at the time.

"There just weren't any girls of our height," Scholten Wood said. "It was great for our team because they didn't have any way to counter that."

But Steve Haaser, who coached Scholtens Wood at Southside, said some thought her success in high school might not translate to college.

"They thought she was too weak and frail," Haaser said. "A college coach I was talking to said 'Don't you think she'll get pushed around?'"

Those people couldn't have been more wrong.

Scholtens Wood later became a Kodak All-American during her stellar college career at Vanderbilt and went on to be tabbed as one of the top college basketball players in America by USA Today after she scored 2,602 points, which currently ranks second in Vanderbilt women's basketball history, and grabbed 1,272 rebounds -- still tops in the school record book.

She went on to be enshrined in both the Arkansas and Tennessee Sports Halls of Fame.

"She was a once-in-a-lifetime type player to get to coach and have on your team," Haaser said. "What I remember is she had great hands. Any ball you threw to her -- if you got it close, she was going to catch it. And she shot 85 percent from the free-throw line as a senior.

"That was big because she got double- and triple-teamed a lot and they would just hammer her. So she got a lot of opportunities."

Scholtens Wood likes the way the women's game has evolved, but she's not sure how she would fit in today.

"So many players can play so many positions," Scholtens Wood said. "The big girls can dribble and shoot the three. And it's part of the offense where it's designed for them to do that.

Arkansas coach Mike Neighbors thinks her athleticism and skill would translate well to today's more wide-open game.

"I think she would have been even a better player in today's game," Neighbors said. "The game had not evolved enough to allow some of the things she was capable of doing to be highlighted or appreciated."

Despite the self-doubt when she was younger, Scholtens Wood has plenty of fond memories of her high school days.

She would do it all over again.

"People say 'No' a lot of the time when asked if they would go do high school over again," Scholtens Wood said. "I'd go back and do it in a heartbeat. There were great experiences. The school and the whole town was behind us. That support was so great.

"I'm not saying it was perfect. There were parts of it that were hard but I'd go back and do it again for sure."