The Butler women’s basketball welcomes a total of five transfers to the roster this season. Photos by Lauren Hough.
KOBE MOSLEY | MANAGING EDITOR | kmosley@butler.edu
‘Welcome to the Team’ is a Q&A series where the Collegian sits down with first-year student-athletes who are entering their first season at Butler University. This week, the Collegian will focus on transfer student-athletes for our special basketball issue. These articles will address why they chose Butler, what they hope to get out of this season and some personal tidbits that you won’t find anywhere else.
This week, managing editor Kobe Mosley sat down with three transfers who are playing for Butler’s women’s basketball team: Kelsy Taylor, Anna Mortag and Shay Frederick.
Kelsy Taylor
Kelsy Taylor is a 6-foot-2 graduate forward from Louisville, Ky. Taylor is pursuing her MBA from the Lacy School of Business. She transferred from Division III Trine University, where she started in all 32 games last season.
Kobe Mosley: What about playing in the Big East are you most excited about?
Kelsy Taylor: I’m most excited about the experience, to travel to different gyms and to play against bigger players. Going from [Division III] to [Division I] is a big transition, so I’m excited about my last year and just making memories with my team and my new family.
KM: What do you hope to bring to the team this year?
KT: I really hope to just bring leadership. This is my fifth year playing basketball — I know the ins and outs of it at this point, it’s nothing new to me. So just being a leader on the court, especially a vocal leader, like I need them to hear my voice all the time. And just the energy, like I’m pretty sure I’m like the hype man of the team. So just bring the energy every day and just get our team going.
KM: Tell me more about “College Craves?”
KT: I had a cooking business back home. In [Division III], [you don’t have to do basketball in the summers]. So … every Friday I would sell plates. And every Friday it’d be a different dish like hibachi, soul food, barbecue. Every Friday … that would just be my job basically … I can’t necessarily do it here because [Division I basketball] takes up too much time. So what I do on my Instagram story is I try to find like cheap meals for college students and I call it “College Craves.” I try to make easy meals and cheap meals so college students can cook them something that’s healthy — make sure you got your greens, your proteins, your carbs. I just keep that going because cooking is a real big passion of mine.
KM: Why do you wear #44?
KT: I started wearing it in high school, and it was just like a regular number. But my senior year, my father passed. [I had previously] decided that I was gonna go back to 21 because I had that in middle school — 21 is my favorite number. Then I couldn’t get 21, so I chose 44. And then I kept 44 because … when I found out that [my father] died, the time was 4:44. So it’s like he’s always with me.
KM: What’s your go-to karaoke song before practice?
KT: I love country breakup songs. I don’t know what it is about them. But my go-to one is “Before He Cheats” by Carrie Underwood. I love that one. It’s like you just get into it every time.
Anna Mortag
Anna Mortag is a 6-foot-1 junior forward from Milwaukee, Wis. Mortag is majoring in sociology and criminology. She is transferring from IUPUI, where she played for two years for current Butler head coach Austin Parkinson.
Kobe Mosley: You are one of the few players on the team that have been to the NCAA tournament. How does having that experience impact your role on the team?
Anna Mortag: I think it kind of helps us see where things can go and pushes us to go back to the tournament. I mean, it’s definitely something that we all want and we know the work and the effort that we have to put in … and just trust Coach P and the other coaches and their system because it works.
KM: What do you think separates Coach P from other coaches?
AM: I would say his attention to detail and his dedication. You can tell he’s very passionate about what he does, and he wants the best for the whole team. He’ll do anything to make a good difference and do anything for the team.
KM: Are you looking forward to playing your former team, IUPUI, on Nov. 13?
AM: Yeah, I’m looking forward to it, seeing my old teammates and stuff. It’s definitely gonna be a little weird, but it’ll be good to see them, and I hope that they’re doing well over there.
KM: What’s your favorite hobby outside of basketball?
AM: I like to be outdoors, do [outdoorsy] things, other sports like beach volleyball … or just being with my family.
Shay Frederick
Shay Frederick is a 5-foot-7 graduate guard from Greenville, Wis., and is pursuing her master’s in communications. Frederick is transferring from Valparaiso University, where she led her conference in assists in consecutive seasons.
Kobe Mosley: When I spoke with Coach P last week, he told me that you were “an extremely intelligent player” and that on the court you “make people better?” What specific aspects of your game do you think make you such a high-IQ basketball player?
Shay Frederick: I would just say I really just try to play with what the defense gives me and not try to do too much and really try to, as a point guard … put my teammates in a position where they can succeed.
KM: What were some of the reasons that you chose to transfer to Butler?
SF: I chose to transfer to Butler honestly … because of the coaching staff. Coach P, I just have a lot of respect for him and what his coaching staff [did] at IUPUI. [It was] pretty incredible, and I’ve been kind of following them because I had some friends on IUPUI. I’ve always just really admired what they did there and the culture that they have. So that was really, really important to me. And just his knowledge of the game — I knew I could learn a lot from him. And obviously, Butler is in a great conference, a great school academically, and Hinkle is pretty cool, too.
KM: In your senior season at Valpo, you were the only player to start all 30 games. I’m sure you had to battle some injuries here and there, so where does that strong desire to be there for your team come from?
SF: I just have such a passion for the game of basketball … I just hate missing games. So yeah, there’s a lot of bumps and bruises to go through, but honestly, it just comes from wanting to be out there for my team. We put in so much work together in practice and everything and I just want to be out there with them competing and win games … I love it. I would do anything to be out there.
KM: Why do you wear #5?
SF: I always have kind of been number five, actually. When I was really young, one of our good family friends, our neighbor, they had a daughter in high school, and she passed away in a car accident. She was number five, so I kind of wore it to honor her and the family let me keep wearing it [to] honor her because her number got retired in high school but they brought back the jersey so I can wear it in honor of her. So honestly, that is a huge reason just because how close we were with them and it was a tragedy and … she played basketball and I wanted to honor her on the court.
KM: Who is your favorite NBA player and WNBA player?
SF: My favorite NBA player would have to be Steph Curry and my favorite WNBA player would have to be Sabrina Ionescu.
