Hey. If you're looking for Jessie Wolff, you won't find her here.
Not here, either.
Keep going.
A little more.
Here she is.
To find Jessie Wolff you have to look down, way down. The senior point guard for the Watertown girls basketball team is just 5-foot-2. On the basketball court, however, she stands out like a 7-footer.
``It doesn't really matter how tall you are,'' Wolff said. ``The thing of it is, when you're playing you don't really know that you're that small. After I've been playing good all game long I'm kind of like, `How tall am I?' ''
Wolff has been told she is too small her entire basketball-playing life. Opposing players have overlooked her. Coaches have overlooked her. Big-time colleges have overlooked her.
She wears the chip on her shoulder like a badge of honor. It serves as a constant reminder of what everyone thinks of her and her undersized team -- Watertown doesn't have a player on its roster who is taller than 5-11. But most of all, it serves as motivation.
``Jessie's so small that when coaches see her size, it's just hard to believe that she can play,'' Goslings coach Steve Jacobson said.
So go ahead and be like everyone else. When the Goslings (17-7) take on third-ranked Kettle Moraine (22-1) in the quarterfinals of the WIAA state tournament at 6:35 tonight at the UW Field House, look past Wolff and her teammates.
She dares you.
``We've been so overlooked this whole season and we have a good team,'' Wolff said. ``No one was expecting Watertown to come to Madison. We kind of proved a lot to a lot of people.''
Thanks largely -- pun intended -- to Wolff. In the sectional final Saturday against heavily favored No. 4 Madison West, Wolff went head-to-head with University of Wisconsin recruit Candas Smith. When the dust settled, Wolff and the Goslings were on top, 62-58.
``That's the kind of game I live to play for,'' said Wolff, who lit up the Regents for 32 points. ``It was the opportunity of a lifetime. (Smith is) a great player. You know, I've always thought of myself as a decent player and I've just never gotten the exposure or the hype as some of the bigger, better-known players. It was a chance for me to prove that I can play with the best of them.''
On the court, Wolff is lightning quick and has no fear. She will rain jumpers from behind the three-point line or kill you with dribble penetration.
``I love going into the lane,'' she said with a wry smile.
But for a time this season, Wolff wasn't dribbling anywhere. During the Goslings' game against West Bend West in December, Wolff suffered a high ankle sprain. She spent two weeks in a hard cast and watched from the sidelines as Watertown went 2-2 without her.
In the long run, however, the injury made Wolff and Watertown better. Not only did Wolff learn that she doesn't have to do it all for the Goslings, she realized how good she has it.
``I kind of learned that every game you have to go out and play as if it might be your last game,'' Wolff said.
Wolff is a three-sport star for the Goslings. She was the Little Ten Conference player of the year in tennis, the likely choice for that honor in basketball and a three-time all-conference performer in soccer. Her athletic and academic talents -- Jacobson said she has a 4.0 grade-point average -- have attracted schools like Minnesota, Miami (Ohio) and UW-Milwaukee.
But Wolff has some unfinished business to take care of first.
Like making sure nobody overlooks her again.
