African American Feature No. 2: One of the Best Women's Basketball Players in UMKC History
2/12/2019 2:56:00 PM | Women's Basketball
KANSAS CITY, Mo. - UMKC Athletics is proud to announce a four-part series celebrating African American History during the month of February. Each individual featured is a key member of Roo athletic history and impacting the University in a lasting and positive manner. The second part in this series features women's basketball alum Stephanie Worthy (1984-1986).
Worthy was a point guard and played with UMKC for two seasons. Wearing the #22 jersey, she was an NAIA First Team All-America selection and was named the NAIA District 16 Player of the Year during her last season (1985-86).
Worthy earned NAIA Second Team all-America honors in 1984-85. Additionally, she holds six of the top-10 single game scoring outputs in UMKC history. Her 18.9 career scoring average is tops all-time on the UMKC chart.
By the end of her basketball career, she ranked first in steals with 269, second in rebounds with 696 and field goals with 540. In addition, Worthy is the highest scorer in UMKC history posting 712 points in a single season. She is the lone Roo to be named to the NAIA All-America teams multiple times.
Worthy played on two highly successful teams, as the Roos combined for 55 wins in Worthy's two seasons of competition. At the end of the 1984-85 season, UMKC finished fifth in the NAIA national tournament, the second-high finish in school history.
Worthy was even respected by her competitors. Former UMKC athlete, Lee Rodgers, played against Worthy in a local recreational league. “It was always a battle,” commented Rodgers. “She was a fierce competitor, one to be admired and respected. If you played basketball in the KC area, you knew who she was.”
In 2008, Worthy, along with other UMKC greats like Catalina Suarez-Moss, were inducted into the UMKC Hall of Fame. UMKC recognizes Worthy as “one of the top women's basketball players in UMKC history.”
After Worthy's basketball career, she went on to be the head girls' basketball coach at Lincoln College Preparatory Academy in Kansas City, Mo. Now she is a paraprofessional where she assists students with reading, writing, spelling, and comprehension skills.
African American History Month pays tribute to the generations of African Americans who struggled with adversity to achieve full citizenship in American society. This event was initially a week-long recognition in February that began in 1926. The celebration was expanded to a month in 1976, the nation's bicentennial. For more information, CLICK HERE.
