Korngable never stopped preparing for starring role

By the numbers, it is very clear that Liv Korngable has never associated a lack of playing time with losing interest in being her best self as a basketball player at the University of South Dakota.

On a talented team, the reality is that not everybody enters the starting lineup as a sophomore and then starts for three more years.

Certainly the Coyotes have had prominent players who have followed that route during the tenure of Dawn Plitzuweit, but it’s far from an automatic route to graduation for one of the best mid-major programs in the country.

Just as reserves must sometimes wait patiently and stay ready game-by-game to gain access to meaningful minutes, so too must they sometimes take that attitude season-by-season.

In either scenario, preparation and attitude play a vital role. For Korngable, now a senior who has earned a starting spot, the stats now reveal she never quit preparing.

“My goal here was always to grow and improve every year, regardless of playing time,” said the 5-8 senior, who has an additional year of eligibility – like the rest of the team – now with the NCAA granting a waiver for the 2020-21 season because of the pandemic. “I’ve seen that manifest itself. It feels like a reward for putting the time in and sticking to the plan.”

The Rochester, Minnesota, native has made the jump from averaging 16.6 minutes and 4.7 points a game in 2019-20 for the 30-2 Coyotes to 30.5 minutes and 15.8 points a game this year. This season’s effort includes a .547 shooting percentage – a crazy success rate for a guard – and a 19-of-38 performance from beyond the 3-point-line.

In addition, she is coming off a 10-for-11 single-game shooting show and 11 straight makes in the Coyotes’ most recent series sweep against Kansas City, one bucket shy of the program record.

“She’s playing really well,” Plitzuweit said. “What the numbers don’t show you is how she’s competing at the defensive end and how well she communicates with the other players.”

Plitzuweit describes Korngable as a focused but also fun-loving director of traffic. She knows where everybody is supposed to be. That may not be a huge deal with her fellow seniors all the time but it means a ton with the younger players.

“She brings out everyone’s best,” Plitzuweit said. “If you watched, you’d see her pointing and talking to them. It’s all in the way she carries herself – very effective and very confident. It’s like ‘This is what we have to do so let’s get it done.’ It’s all very urgent.”

Korngable has additional skills that don’t show up on the stats sheet, or even on the basketball court. She is conspicuously health-conscious, for instance. It’s not uncommon for her to take younger players to the grocery store for little healthy-eating tutorials. She’ll even come over and teach them how to prepare a few of her favorite (healthy) meals.

“I have to bully the freshmen a little bit sometimes,” she joked. “It can be tough to break out of that fast-food habit.”

She’s also considered sort of an expert on tea. Or at least more knowledgeable than most of her teammates.

The truth is that Korngable and her tea can turn into quite a conversation. She knows a lot about tea, you learn, but pairs it with realistic expectations. It’s a rare combination in that world to like tea but also acknowledge its limitations. 

“It’s part of my nightly routine,” she said. “It means it's time to slow down. Usually I’ll sip something like chamomile or lavender with a little honey and lemon. It’s just something to get me all tucked in for the night.”

She occasionally attempts to promote tea’s benefits, with varying success. Take teammate and fellow senior Chloe Lamb, for instance.

“One time I’m like ‘Chloe, do you want some tea? And she says ‘Yea, I’ll take some tea.' And then she says ‘I think I’m just going to chug it.’ You know that’s just Chloe being Chloe. So then I said ‘That’s not the point, Chloe. Take it slow and sip it slowly.’ I realized she was just trying to irritate me. She got under my skin a little bit on that one.”

During this conversation about tea she was asked about the best flavors. Her interviewer made it known that the colorful packaging and staunch claims of flavor on the boxes never seemed to deliver.

“Yep,” she said. “They all still sorta taste like dirt, don’t they? You have to hit it with the lemon and honey otherwise it’s like drinking dirt water.”

Noted. Nothing like some straight talk about tea.

Obviously, Korngable brings a sense of humor to her challenges, but it’s only because of a strong will and a ton of work – she’s one of the campus’ most dedicated weightlifters – that she’s put herself in position to make such significant contributions in 2020-21.

That would include those direct words of wisdom she passes along within the program, but also the example she has set over time.

“It’s great for us because there are other kids in the program who are in the same situation she was in,” Plitzuweit said. “It might not be their time to play yet. But they can look up to her and follow her example and do the work while they’re waiting. Then when it’s their time, they’re going to be ready for it just like Liv was. That’s a neat part of this. She continued to make us better while she was making herself better."