Her pro future looked bleak, now WNBA all-star is Delaware Athlete of the Year

Betnijah Laney’s late-blooming pro basketball excellence has been lauded by the WNBA.

The 6-foot swing guard was voted the league’s Most Improved Player and to its All-Defensive Team in 2020. In her sixth season in 2021, Laney made her first All-Star Game appearance.

Now the state in which Laney starred as a high school player has handed out its highest acclaim.

Laney, 28, has been voted the 2021 Delaware Athlete of the Year by the Delaware Sportswriters and Broadcasters Association, which Monday awarded Laney its 73rd annual John J. Brady Award.

In her first season with the New York Liberty in 2021, the Smyrna High grad averaged a team-high 16.8 points, which ranked 10th in the league, 4.1 rebounds and a career-high 5.2 assists per game, which was seventh in the WNBA.

The recognition comes less than two years after Laney was cut by the Indiana Fever and thought her career may be over.

Paul Jordan, Laney's youth coach at Mallery Recreation Center in Philadelphia, accepted the award on her behalf, saying Laney was "overlooked" and "an afterthought" on WNBA teams before the last two seasons.

"When you use the word perseverance, it really defines who she is," he said.

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Laney, the 2011 state girls basketball Player of the Year, could not attend Monday’s DSBA’s awards luncheon at DuPont Country Club because she was doing promotional appearances for the WNBA during the NBA’s All-Star Weekend in Cleveland.

“It means a lot to me to be able to receive this award, that all my hard work has been noticed and I’m able to represent the state of Delaware in a positive manner,” said Laney, who added that it wouldn’t have happened without the strong support of her family and friends.

Laney is the second WNBA player to win the award, joining four-time recipient Elena Delle Donne, the two-time league MVP and 2016 Olympic gold medalist out of Ursuline Academy and the University of Delaware.

Also honored were long-time DFRC executive director Tony Glenn, who received the Herm Reitzes Award for community service; ex-Caesar Rodney and Wesley athlete Alexis Howerin, a breast cancer survivor who accepted the Buddy Hurlock Unsung Hero Award; the Delmar High field hockey 2021 state Team of the Year; and the Tubby Raymond Award winner as Delaware 2021 Coach of the Year Nancy Griskowitz from St. Mark’s volleyball.

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BEATING CANCER: Howerin heard a death sentence, battled for survival

PERFECT AGAIN: Coach of the Year Griskowitz led St. Mark’s state champs

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Since no awards ceremony was held last year due to COVID-19, 2020 honorees were also recognized: former Philadelphia Union and present U.S. National Team soccer player Mark McKenzie (athlete of the year); Ursuline Academy cross-country and track and field coach Jim Fischer (coach of the year); Appoquinimink High boys soccer (team of the year); Dover High athlete Qualeak Bumbrey (Hurlock); and longtime Dover Little League volunteer Ed Coker (Reitzes).

Laney was a second-round pick, 17th overall, in the 2015 WNBA Draft by the Chicago Sky out of Rutgers, where she is among the all-time leading scorers and rebounders and was a senior All-American.

She averaged 3.6 points and 2.6 rebounds per game her first four WNBA seasons, playing in Chicago in 2015-16, missing 2017 with a torn ACL, then with the Connecticut Sun in 2018 and Indiana Fever in 2019. Laney started just three of 69 career games her first three seasons.

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After being cut by Indiana a month before the start of the pandemic-delayed 2020 season, Laney’s breakthrough came when she signed with the Atlanta Dream, which had openings due to player opt-outs.

Before that, she'd continued training after spring 2020 pandemic shutdowns on the basketball court at Smyrna Middle School and on the football field and track at Smyrna High.

Providing encouragement -- and sometimes rebounding during those on-court sessions -- was her mother Yolanda Laney. She was an All-American who sparked Cheyney to the first NCAA women’s basketball title game in 1982 under coach C. Vivian Stringer, who was later Betnijah’s coach at Rutgers.

"When opportunity came, she was ready, and now she's sitting on top of the WNBA," Yolanda said.

"When she came down and said Indiana had cut her, I said 'Well, that means God has something bigger and better for you than what you had in Indiana so don't look at it and be upset and mad that they cut you. You get ready now.'"

Laney flourished with the Dream, averaging career highs of 17.2 points, 4.9 rebounds, 4.0 assists, 1.6 steals and 33.3 minutes while starting every game in the Florida bubble.

“She just showed that she can score at all three levels,” Atlanta coach Nicki Collen said that year of Laney, who shot career highs of 48.1 percent from the field and 40.5 percent on 3-pointers.

That earned the free agent a contract with the Liberty that, reports said, was for three years and $588,800. The Liberty play at Barclays Center in Brooklyn.

Yolanda said that, during her daughter's first three WNBA seasons, she was stuck on rosters with older, proven players, which limited opportunity. When she did get a chance to play more, she was typecast as a defensive specialist.

It wasn't until Laney was signed by Atlanta, Yolanda added, that "the coach looks at her and can't believe the way she can shoot . . . She just didn't get the opportunity."

The versatile Laney became just the fourth player in WNBA history to average more 16 points, five assists and four rebounds per game in 2021.

"Betnijah is so talented and now everybody is getting to see just how talented," Yolanda said.

Have an idea for a compelling local sports story or is there an issue that needs public scrutiny? Contact Kevin Tresolini at ktresolini@delawareonline.com and follow on Twitter @kevintresolini. Support local journalism by subscribing to delawareonline.com.

This article originally appeared on Delaware News Journal: WNBA all-star Laney of New York Liberty Delaware athlete of the year