High school basketball: Michigan-bound Hersey senior Katie Eidle focused on finale

Katy Eidle gets the point — for now, anyway.

The Hersey senior is committed to Michigan, where she’s projected to be a shooting guard.

But for her final season with the Huskies, she’ll be running the point one more time.

“For high school, that’s the role I take, trying to enhance that position,” she said.

Veteran Hersey coach Mary Fendley appreciates having a four-star prospect — she’s No. 77 in the espnW/HoopGurlz rankings — in that spot.

“Katy is such a skilled player,” Fendley said. “We’re lucky enough to have some really good athletes on our team. Katy being the point guard allows her to direct the show.”

Indeed: Eidle is one of three Huskies seniors who are committed to compete in Division I — in three different sports, no less. Meghan Mrowicki, who will be back at some point after completing her rehab from a torn ACL, is a Notre Dame soccer recruit and Kelsey Neary is committed to Connecticut for lacrosse.

So Eidle will have some capable options as she runs the offense for Hersey after averaging 19.9 points, 5.3 rebounds, 4.1 assists and 2.9 steals a game as a junior.

Being able to focus just on her high school finale is a relief after wrapping up a recruiting process that had some twists along the way.

Michigan, which reached the Elite Eight and finished 25-7 last season, was in the mix for Eidle for a few years. “My relationship with the head coach [Kim Barnes Arico] was really strong,” Eidle said.

The Wolverines did have a staff change over the offseason when Carrie Moore left to become head coach at Harvard and was replaced by Erin Batth. “There’s no issue with that,” Eidle said. “I got along with [the staff] really well, the connection was there.”

After the pandemic eased and recruiting shifted back from Zoom calls to visits and in-person contacts, Eidle was able to get on campus and liked what she saw.

“I wanted to commit before the season, I did not know I would do it that early,” she said. “I visited, and it clicked. I knew that’s where I wanted to be. It took a lot of stress out.”

Eidle has been playing basketball almost as long as she can remember and joined the Wolverines AAU program as a third-grader. She dabbled in other sports up until seventh grade but has been all basketball ever since.

She appreciates being part of a special senior class in Illinois. Six players at IHSA schools are ranked in the national top 100, and three of them could cross paths in the Big Ten: Eidle; No. 8- Emily Fisher of Libertyville, who is headed to Maryland; and No. 83 Lenee Beaumont of Benet, who is committed to Indiana.

“We all know each other and we all get along well,” Eidle said. “We love each other’s success. … It’s going to be cool playing against each other [in college].”