Tyra Buss And Her New-Look Jumper To Undergo First Test Tonight

Tyra Buss doesn’t need to prove her ability as a scorer. The stats do that.

IU’s junior point guard already owns the program scoring record over two seasons. As she begins a new campaign at 7 p.m. against Presbyterian, she sits just 18 points away from being the quickest woman in school history to reach 1,000 points.

What Buss has done up until this point clearly works. But that hasn’t stopped her from working to add an element to her game that she’s lacked since stepping foot on campus—a jump shot.

“That’s really the one thing I can say I just don’t have right now,” Buss said earlier this fall. “I’ve relied a lot on getting to the bucket and the line. But now I want to be more consistent from the outside.”

Buss shot 41.4 percent from the floor as a sophomore and just 30.7 percent from beyond the arc but did the bulk of her scoring either around the rim or at the line. Nobody in the Big Ten got fouled while shooting quite like Buss, who made a program record 203-of-263 shots from the charity stripe.

But even before assistant coach Glenn Box arrived in June after spending the last two seasons at Saint Louis, he noticed on film that Buss somehow managed to play with a limited outside game. It was a rare missing piece in a preseason All-Big Ten guard.

So Box went to work. He initially met with the rest of IU's staff to develop a plan of attack and then began meeting with Buss one-on-one throughout the summer to overhaul her jump shot that was never quite high enough to be a weapon.

“It’s hard to be consistent shooting the ball from where she starts it in the mid-range,” he said. “She recognized that, and give her credit, she committed to fixing it.”

Box would spend as much time as the NCAA allowed working with Buss each week to develop her shot. He didn't want to tinker too much at the risk of going too far, but wanted everything from hand placement to elevation to get higher in the air.

After their sessions ended, Buss would set the shooting gun back up and keep going.

Then she’d come back again.

“I don’t think it’s magic," Box said. "It’s all about her. She’s shooting a stronger jump shot, a more consistent jump shot. She’s been making gains since she started in the summer. I’ve walked through it with her and talked about it with her, but she’s owned it.”

Buss, who’s listed at just 5-foot-8, hasn’t shied away from getting beat up to score in the paint.

She’d slither through whatever open lanes she could find in the lane, absorb contact from a larger post player and finish at the rim or hit a floater. She wound up eighth in the Big Ten in scoring, but couldn’t help but feel she left more on the table.

“I didn’t really have that pull-up game into my arsenal," Buss said. "[Box] saw that watching film before he even got here.”

Box said the beauty of Buss adding a jumper is that it’ll actually make her more effective getting to the bucket where she’s already comfortable. The lanes to the basket will get wider once opponents need to step up and respect Buss from distance.

“This will eliminate her from forcing extra things,” Box said. “Because sometimes that little seven-foot, eight-foot jump shot is better than going against a 6-foot-3 post player. I think ultimately it’s going to make her game easier.”

If it works, that's bad news for the rest of the Big Ten.

Because for the first time publicly, Buss has begun bringing up the idea of playing professionally after college. That could mean at the WNBA level or perhaps even overseas where female athletes typically earn more money.

Playing at the pro level means having a pro-level game. For now, that means adding a jumper.

Her offseason overhaul on that new-look jumper is going to be put to the test tonight, which could be historic if Buss reaches 18 points — less than her single-game scoring average a year ago.

“Great players, truly great players, they understand what they need to get better on,” Box said. “I think you’re seeing that with Tyra and her commitment to her jump shot. And it’ll be exciting to see where it goes.”