Sunday night in Atlanta the #12 ranked Delaware Blue Hens women's basketball team beat Georgia State to remain undefeated in conference play. Led by Elena Della Donne's 31 pts and Lauren Carra's 18 the mid-major team won again. Newswatch 16 sports traveled to Delaware last week to check in on some of our local talent.
Newark Delaware is where you will find junior guard Lauren Carra. The former Dunmore lady buck basketball star is in the Delaware "Blue Hen" starting lineup averaging 9 point per game.
Lauren is also playing alongside the best player in the country right now Elena Della Donne. The 6-5 junior All-American scores 28 point a night.
"I mean it's unbelievable to ask me 3 years ago when I committed here if we would be the #12 team in the country I don't think I would have been able to say that, but this is an unbelievable run and we're a mid-major team in the top 25 in the country. I mean this is living a dream for me." said Lauren Carra.
"She can really shoot the ball. She's very smart. She understood the game. She had great coaching in high school and obviously her team was very successful. We look at all those qualities when we're looking for a young lady to come to the university of Delaware, and Lauren fit all of those and she's a very good student." said Tina Martin.
Della Donne is from Delaware and transferred back home from UConn to be with her sister Lizzie. Who suffers from cerebral palsy and lives without sight and hearing.
"Elena is a special kid because she has a special needs sister who she loves very much. She's played so well for us all year long. It's really good that the community has really backed this program. I mean we get four or five thousand people at every game and there's no greater feeling as a coach or a player to come into this arena and have that kind of attention." again said Tina.
"Elena's an amazing player. We see triple teams-double teams on Elena every single night, and Elena always finds the open man. So we all work very well together." said Kayla Miller.
The connection between the University of Delaware and northeast and central pennsylvania goes far beyond just Lauren Carra from Dunmore. There's Sarah Acker from Nanticoke, Kayla Miller has ties to Pottsville, and even head coach Tina Martin has a local connection. She is a native of Williamsport and was a two time all-american at Lock Haven University in Clinton County.
"I call it the PA connection. Pennsylvania is dear to my heart. My parents live in Williamsport. It's nice I always go back to my home state and I'm always looking for good players in our home state." again said Tina.
6 conference games remain for the Blue Hens before the post season CAA tounament back in Maryland where Delaware suffered their only loss of the season.
"Delaware's never won a CAA championship so that is definitely our #1 goal for the end of the season to win the caa championship." again said Kayla.
