Hoosier basketball in Illinois—can it work?

If you ask Dianna Wingis, then the answer is yes. The Indiana native left her home in Hammond and entered a new world at NIU last fall as a member of the women’s basketball team. Wingis came to the campus not knowing anyone except the coaching staff.

“It was real scary at first,” Wingis said. “I didn’t know anyone, but NIU is a friendly place and I made a lot of new friends.”

Not only did Wingis have to get used to her new environment, but she also had to cope with the rigorous challenge of being a Huskie cager. Just as she was finding her niche as a college student and ballplayer, the 6-foot-3-inch forward came down with mononucleosis.

“It was awful,” Wingis said. “I was out of school for about six weeks, and I didn’t practice for 10 weeks. It really made things difficult because I missed all the conditioning. When I got back I was just kind of thrown into practices, which was hard because I wasn’t in shape.”

Dianna did not let this get her down. She worked her way up and has found herself starting in six games so far this season. Besides keeping a positive mental attitude, Wingis keeps a saying in the back of her mind which she uses when she gets down: “The harder you work, the harder it is to surrender.”

“My high school basketball coach gave me that saying to get me to push harder,” Wingis said. “Everybody has a saying or goal and that just kind of stuck with me.”

The business major is becoming a catalyst for the squad. She holds a .523 field goal shooting percentage, with her high scoring game of 20 points against Illinois-Chicago.

“I am extremely pleased,” coach Jane Albright said about Wingis’s performance this season. “She can be a great impact for us. I was disappointed when she was not healthy, but her last six games have been just like I wanted from the very first game.”

Albright learned about Wingis through a coaching friend in South Carolina. In the summer of Dianna’s senior year, a Gary newspaper called Dianna “the best center in the state.”

“We started recruiting really early for her,” the Huskie boss said. “She was kind of hidden, because she didn’t come from a strong basketball program, plus she was heavily recruited for volleyball.”

“She (Albright) was real caring and supportive,” Wingis said. “She was interested in me as a person.”

Wingis’s impressive background made it hard for Albright not to notice the Hoosier. Wingis finished her prep career owning 11 of 14 all-time records at Clark High School. She was the first female basketball player at her alma mater to pass the 1,000-point mark, finishing with 1,130 points and 1,004 rebounds. She led the Pioneers with 20.8 ppg and 13.8 rbpg in a 14-8 senior season that ended at the sectional championship. She was named The Hammond Times’ 1986 Player of the Year as well as to the First Team All-State squad of Hoosier Basketball Magazine, a publication where she made the front cover. She was also All-State in volleyball.

“I picked basketball over volleyball in college because it has more opportunity and it is more competitive,” Wingis said. “It was a really close choice, but one day I just knew what I wanted.”

Dianna is looking to the future right now. Although the Huskies are not having the kind of season they wanted, Dianna said she hopes they finish strong.

“We want to win the rest of our games and start preparing for next year,” Wingis said. “This summer will mean how much we improve.”