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'Rico' provides wealth of talent for women's hoops

German-born Kuypers finds niche in America as UCLA point guard

By Hye Kwon

The UCLA women's basketball might be having a hard time going where they want to this season, but one player who has already traveled a long way to be where she wants to be is Ricarda Kuypers.

Known as "Rico" by her peers, Kuypers has come from Aechen, Germany where she was born and raised. After graduating from Dreieich Gymnasium, she chose to come to the United States to do something different.

"I came here to experience a different country and a different culture," Kuypers said.

Playing basketball, of course had a lot to do with her decision. After all, she's been competing in basketball ever since her youth. In Germany, Kuypers played for a club team called Eimtracht Frankfurt for three years. Kuypers lists her team's club national championship run in 1992 as one of her career highlights.

When she first arrived in America at the age of 19, Kuypers enrolled herself at Orange Coast College in Orange County. She averaged 13.7 points and 6.7 assists per game while leading OCC to the California Junior College Elite Eight. Kuypers earned All-Empire League honors and was selected All-Southern California.

"The level of play at OCC was definitely lower than here at UCLA," Kuypers said. "But it was fun. We had a good team."

After the completion of her freshman year several four-year universities, which included UCLA, were interested in Kuypers. She received offers from many schools around the Western United States but chose to come to UCLA.

"I could have gone to Arizona, Oregon, Oregon State, Hawaii or New Mexico State, but I decided to come here because I had a lot of friends in the Orange County and the Los Angeles areas," Kuypers said. "Also, I really liked my recruiting trip here. I had a lot of fun."

Kuypers' role in this year's Bruin team has changed drastically from last year. Last season, Kuypers did not have the pressure of being one of the team's leaders. In front of her on the depth chart was Detra Lockhart, who displayed tremendous talent at the point guard position. The task that Kuypers had last year was to come in and give the team a solid 15 to 20 minutes backing up Lockhart at the point guard position.

But this year, Kuypers is relied on to carry the young team on her shoulders. Kuypers has started all but one game for the Bruins, averaging 32 minutes per outing, which ­ along with Nikki Hilbert ­ is tops on the team. Kuypers leads the team in assists with 61 and is third on the team in scoring with 9.5 points per game.

"I definitely feel that I have a lot of responsibilities especially because I'm playing point guard," Kuypers said. "I would say that I do feel the pressure because of that, but so far I don't think that I have helped the team enough with my abilities."

One thing that's for sure is that the competitive nature of Kuypers does not epitomize the manner in which the Bruins have struggled this year. The Bruins have a 7-10 overall record and a conference record of 2-6 which is worst in the conference. But Kuypers believes that the team should not dwell on past losses but look to the future.

"We can't look back at what happened," Kuypers said. "We can analyze and learn from (the losses) but we have to go on."

Come next season, UCLA will feature three "Diaper Dandies" in Erica Gomez, Mari Burningham and Takiyah Jackson. But Kuypers is still optimistic about the team's success in the remaining games in the Pac-10.

"Getting Erica, Takiyah and Mari will give us a lift next year, but I still think that we can play a lot better than we are actually playing," Kuypers said.

As far as long-term plans are concerned, Kuypers has ambitious goals. She plans to play basketball professionally in Europe and has plans to try out for the German National Team this April.

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