STrib: The Jasmines Play as Two Peas in a Pod

[Ignatius L Hoops]

Two peas in a pod, that's the Gophers' Jasmine Powell and Jasmine Brunson

Two guards bonded on the backcourt and as friends.

www.startribune.com

Kent Youngblood:

It began last summer. Jasmine Powell was in town early, getting ready for her freshman season at the University of Minnesota. Jasmine Brunson was getting ready for her final year with the Gophers women’s basketball team.

They roomed together, worked out together. As Powell joked, they saw each other in the morning, at night and everything in-between.

So maybe it was inevitable. Seniors and newbies don’t usually find a lot of common ground, but then this was to become a rather uncommon bond.

“You would think, with a freshman coming in, and a senior, there would be some animosity,” Powell said. “But she accepted me. She brought me in. She showed me the ropes. That’s when we started being friends.”

Good friends. The Gophers like to joke about their two-Jasmine backcourt. But, to be honest, these two have a lot more in common than their first name: a dedication to preparation, a lack of fear, an abundance of energy. A bond so tight that it figures to last long after Brunson has graduated.

...

Brunson was the leader who held the team together when Destiny Pitts and — for one game — Taiye and Kehinde Bello left the team. Powell was the freshman who slid into the starting lineup and ended the regular season as the highest-scoring freshman in the conference (11.9)

“She led us through those times,” Whalen said of Brunson. “She is the only reason we got through it as a team. She banded everyone together and kept us moving. You talk about legacy? There is no greater legacy.’’