Centennial High School’s Lady Titans Point Guard, Madison Ott, sits down with us (via Zoom) to discuss her Junior year season, her 17U Elite Youth team, and what’s to come. With influence from coaches like Jason Terry (yes, the JET) and Brad Blalock, and a stellar support system in her parents, sister, and grandparents, Madi is poised, focused and prepared to reach her goal of continuing her basketball journey into college.
Enjoy episode #57 with Frisco ISD’s Madison Ott. And, listen to more episodes from the Hustle & Pro archives.
Show Notes
- [00:28] Quick Hits
- [01:45] Jason Terry
- [03:15] Sports Growing Up
- [05:08] Junior Year Success
- [09:50] Daily Schedule
- [13:21] Support System
- [15:30] Goals
Resources within this episode:
- Madison Ott: Instagram: @madison_ott_ | Twitter: @madison_ott30
- FISD Athletics
- Centennial High School Athletics
- EYBL Elite Youth Basketball League
- Kelly Walker: Instagram @kelly_walkertexas | Twitter: @kelly_walker_TX
Connect with Lifestyle Frisco:
Transcript: (machine-generated)
Welcome to Hustle and Pro season two talking sports and Frisco from youth to pro. Now here’s your host, Kelly Walker.
Welcome to Hustle and Pro. It’s about time we highlighted another standout FISD student athlete. So today we’re chatting with Madison Ott Centennial High School’s point guard on the basketball team. Hi and welcome Maddie. How are you?
I’m good. How are you?
I’m good. Well I’m excited to take the time to get to know your story a little, but first I have a few quick hits to know you a little bit better. So if I was to ask you who your favorite athlete of all time is, who would you say?
Um, probably for the male side it would be Steph Curry because I just idolize how he plays and his demeanor and for the woman’s side Sabrina Inosceu just because she’s just a big role model of mine and I love how she plays.
What about sports superstitions? So do you have any personally or your team has any habits or game day superstitions that you guys do?
Um, I mean we always usually huddle before games. We always have a superstition that you have to end on a make whatever we’re doing warm up or whatever. So anytime we go to the huddle after warmup, before games, we always end on a making it get shot in.
That’s a good one. And on a make. Okay. What’s your favorite or some of your favorite sports movies?
Oh, um, all time. Favorite is probably Love and Basketball. That was like one of my first favorite basketball movies. Um, I watched Hoosiers as a kid with my dad and that was a good one. Um, 42 is that the baseball movie? I really liked that one too. Yes. That, that was such a cool movie. So those are probably my top three.
Those are great. Okay. Now my first question is a little random, but as I was doing some research on you, I noticed this and I couldn’t help but have to ask you right off the top. How in the world do you know Jason Terry enough for like Twitter conversations and follow you on Twitter?
Um, so my outside of school basketball team is driving nation. I’m on the 17 U EIB L team and he is actually the head coach of that team. So this past summer he was my head coach for all the club basketball throughout the summer. And then this summer my new coach, her name is Edwina Brown, she, she’ll be the new head coach and he’ll be the assistant head coach. So he’s my club head coach and I work with them all as though
That’s pretty amazing. Did you know who he was before he was your coach?
Yeah, I’ve kind of like saw some stories about it and I didn’t know as much about him cause he of course he played like whenever I wasn’t even involved in basketball but I knew about him and my dad was a big fan of his so it was pretty cool to find that out.
So once you kind of find out, did you go back and like look at videos of him or kind of get to see why everybody loves him so much?
Yeah. Yeah, me and my dad, we watched like a lot of his games on the, um, whenever they were in the NBA finals or whatever. It was so cool. Like I, I would always like get nervous to go up to him and he would be like, I’m just your coach. But we are pretty comfortable now, so it’s cool.
Yeah. Good. Well that’s pretty neat. Not many high school students get to say they were coached by somebody like Jason Terry. That’s awesome. Yeah. Okay. So now we’ll go back to my, yeah, my normal line of questioning about your yourself and your sports journey. So I’m always curious what other sports, if any, did you play when you were younger.
I started off with soccer whenever I was like five or something and I played that till I was 10. Um, and then I just kind of tried everything. In middle school I did track soccer, volleyball, basketball, um, I did gymnastics when I was younger, so I kind of tried everything until I fell in love with basketball. I actually didn’t originally like basketball. My parents forced me to play and I did not want to play owl. I was crying before the game. I was so mad that they made me play.
What age is that? So what [inaudible]
I think I was about 10 or 11 so I kind of had like a later start, but I fell in love with it right after the first game. So I was, I definitely liked it after that and then it became serious.
Okay, so you didn’t want to play the first game, but they forced you to and then you were good once you’ve gotten done, why didn’t they want you to play basketball so bad? Does one of them have basketball in their background?
My mom was a track runner. My dad was a golfer, but my sister, she was older than me, so she started basketball before me and they, they just kind of pushed me. They wanted me to try every sport just to see what I like. That’s why I was so involved, everything. So I guess my sister kind of pushed me to play it and my parents, so they just wanted me to try it out.
That’s okay. Once you started playing and you liked it, at what point did you drop other sports and focus just on basketball or are you, are you a multi-sport athlete still? Well into high school.
Right now I’m just involved in basketball. I think in middle school is whenever I kind of did everything cause I got to have time for that. But my summer after eighth grade is whenever I really like honed in and took basketball seriously and wanted to pursue.
Okay. You’re, you’re in your junior season, is that right? Or you’re in your junior year of high school, right?
Yes ma’am.
I know season basketball season just recently wrapped up, which is good for you. So, okay. So I want to, I mentioned that you’re, um, on Centennial’s basketball team, so I wanted to brag on you for just a second cause this is pretty amazing. All the things that you were awarded with. So district nine, five, a academic, all district first team district and the TABC all region team. And there’s a couple of other things, but is this all, I mean this year, right? Was this all your junior year?
Yes ma’am.
Okay. So tell me kind of in your own words, what was this season like for you?
Um, I think coming into this season I knew it was going to be a big one because like for recruiting standpoint that was big for me and also for our team. We were just coming back and me, I felt like we had the, some of the strongest returners in our district, so it was going to be a huge year for our team. I felt like we really worked well together. We had some new pieces come in and it was just a big year for us. I think we played out, I played to my best abilities. I think we had a good year. I don’t think we’ve finished the best that we could have. I think we could’ve gone farther, but I think this year was a really good year for us.
You made the playoffs though, right? Yes. Again, is that something that’s normal for Centennial or is that a new.
I think it was new whenever, uh, whenever coach [inaudible] came in my freshman year, that was the first year we went to playoffs. But from that, I think we set a precedent that we were going to make it each year. And especially the my grade I have another girl, Layla and Peyton that we all came in together and we kind of set the tone that we’re going to do that. And so then the year before my junior year, my sophomore year we went three rounds in and I think our goal this year was to go farther than that and we ended up making it the same distance. We have three routes and then we lost our third game. So I think we had I higher expectations for us, but again, that’s a big step for us and it’s a big accomplishment just in the state of Texas to get that far
Right. Going through rounds in is, is hard. It’s hard to, once you’ve gotten that far, it puts more pressure. Did you feel more pressure to get back to that and and beyond?
For sure. Yeah. I think throughout the season we definitely saw a lot of teams that really honed in on us and like scatted for us a lot more than I felt like others did. So I think we had way bigger target on our back. And I think we stepped up to the challenge though.
Probably. So then going into your senior year, are Layla and Payton, same class as you, are they going to be back you so already then you have one more layer of pressure, right? It’s your senior year, so you want to have a great year but then you got to get back to where you were and go farther. Right. Goal anyway, I’m assuming. Yes ma’am. So during that year, um, I heard that you had really good personal stats to everything. Um, increase like 3.3 point percentage went up and I don’t know all these basketball stats cause basketball is not my main sports but the sport. But um, basically you had a really stellar individual year too. Right? So, um, that being said, do you set individual goals for different areas of stats in different shooting percentages or do you not pay attention to those specifics?
Um, I think goals I definitely want to improve. That’s kind of my big thing is from last year I think I averaged like maybe eight points a game and then it went from this year maybe I think averaging around 15 or 16. So the fact that that double, that was a big accomplishment for me cause I always want to improve. Um, throughout the off season I worked a lot on my shooting and my percentages reflected on that. And so that improved. So my goals, I don’t really set specific numbers. Think improvement’s a big thing for me. Um, I definitely want to be shooting like high percentages, three point shots, like above 30%, mid range, 40%, and then free throw the goal is 90% and then points per game. I feel like that’ll just come as I play. So it definitely wasn’t a number, but it was improvement on that.
Yeah. So let’s talk about some of that off season. So as we record this, we’re in a, we’re in a weird off season, right? I mean you’re a regular school season wrapped up at the end of February I think. So you would have already been in school off season but you would be ramping up, um, like uh, lately right now, right?
Yes ma’am.
So we’re in this weird space where we’re not going to school and you’re not allowed to practice with your team and those kinds of things. So tell me what your, like, what your practice regimen would be. You know, pretty shutdown, just kind of in a normal world like what your, your student athlete day looks like as a Centennial, um, player. And then separately after that, I kind of want to know, I want to talk about what you are doing in a downtime when you’re isolated and pulled away from your teammates. So first tell me about, you know, your, your regular everyday schedule as a student athlete, Centennial.
Um, during the off season period or during when season was happening.
Busy. I don’t know. I kind of want to just know, I take myself back to when I was at high school athlete and I just want to know like at your, at your, your busiest time playing basketball. What does your day look like?
All right. I guess I’ll do off season and usually that’s pretty much when I’m busiest. So I’ll go to school in the morning. We’ll have probably weight room around 8:15 and then we’ll practice till nine ish. And that’s what the school team and then I’ll go to classes. Um, some days I have, I don’t have a fourth period and other days I do. So I guess I’ll do my busy day whenever I’ll get off at 4:15 and then I’ll come home. I’ll probably start my homework and then usually either go to skills or team practice. So I try, like, my goal for myself is to be a division one basketball player and to do that, of course I have to work like every day for that. So I go to skill usually Monday, Wednesday and then I have team practice Thursdays and Sundays. And then Tuesdays I’ll probably go shoot with my dad and then Saturdays I’ll probably try to go get some shots of, so I usually try to be in the gym six days a week. Sundays are usually my days off unless we have team practice. Um, and then like you mentioned, I was academic all districts, so I definitely value my academics a lot. So sometimes I’m up late after practices is doing my studies, doing my homework and stuff like that. So it definitely is very busy, don’t have a lot of space to do my time, but I value those things. So that’s what I put first.
Yeah. Your time is basketball time.
Yes. Yeah, that’s my break time.
That’s your, that’s what you’ve chosen, I guess. Right. Um, so then what about in a time, like right now when, like I said, everything’s on pause and you kind of have to do your own if you’re going to do anything at all. Some athletes are probably not as motivated to, to keep up some training on their own, but what are you doing?
Right. Me and my dad, we definitely agree that during this time some people might take this time to relax, but I definitely want to take this time to get better. Um, I’m working out Monday through Friday with one of my friends, actually we go up to the track, we have like a full workout that we do and we usually go through that. It includes like lunges, squats, burpees, like all this stuff. And so I get that workout in. And then after that, my dad usually comes home around five and we have this court that’s about 10 minutes on the road and it’s pretty nice. It’s got like about six baskets or whatever. And we just go get some shots up my volume lane and stuff like that. So again, with that, I tried to do that six times a week. So I did that today, this morning. Um, and definitely just like want to get better with this, cause I don’t want to have this be a setback for me.
Right. Fortunately for you, it’s not your senior year. I’m sure you have teammates that it is. And so, um, or not even teammates for basketball, but other, you know, classmates that they’re gonna miss out on some of their, in their senior or high school career. So, um, fortunately for you, you don’t have to worry about that because everything’s going to be back to normal. Right. Um, by the time you get to enjoy your senior year. Okay. So let’s talk about that support system. You’ve mentioned your dad a few times, so it sounds like you have some athletic family members. So, um, what does that look like? Do you also have a sibling? You mentioned that, that you can kind of have watched CDs go through this before.
Um, my sister, so she’s a big part in my career and my journey, she played basketball with me, so whenever I was a freshman she was a senior and we got to play together and that was a lot of fun. She obviously, she wasn’t as serious as I was with basketball, but she honestly like encouraged me and pushed me to like be my best all the time. So she doesn’t play basketball anymore, but she’s like my number one fan. And I love her so much and she always like talks to me about how proud it hurt of me. She is and it’s, it’s good to have her around. Um, for the rest of my family. Um, I feel like really blessed cause my family is very supportive. Like even my extended family. Like I’ll get to games early and I’ll go and put up some shots and I’m looking at the stands and I see both all, I have three sets of grandparents and they’re all like sitting, they’re all wearing their Titan shirts all like right here on, it’s just, it’s so cute.
My friends always talk about it. They’re like, Oh, there’s Maddie’s little family. Like they always show up to all the games and I’m just so lucky to have them. Um, my parents are super supportive. Like they’ll pay for all my stuff, they’ll take me to skills and stuff like that. So they’re definitely big supporters of me. My dad, he’s always, he’s always there to rebound. He’s always there to taking the skills. He’s always there to look up new things. He doesn’t know much about basketball, but he’ll find it on YouTube or something like that. So I’m definitely very blessed to have a very supportive fan.
That’s awesome. He doesn’t know much about basketball. What’s his, what’s his sport?
He’s a golfer. So he actually played on the PGA tour and he was a professional golfer for like 20 years. And then when me and my sister came around, he had decided he would stop that and we, um, started coaching, um, golf. So now he’s,
so that’s why you get some regimented practice routines and he knows how that works. Right.
He definitely instills that in me. Yes. That hard work, that work ethic for sure.
That’s pretty great. Okay. So the last thing I want to ask you about, um, your plans and your goals. You’ve mentioned a few times, you know, your junior year, you knew that recruiting was going to start ramping up and you mentioned the [inaudible] goals. So I guess just tell me about that. Like going into your senior year, if you have a goal to play D one do you have specific schools that you have your sights set on or are you open to everything? Like where do you sit with, with how your senior year is gonna play out?
Right. Um, right now I have about 10 to 20, like schools that are talking to me and like actively recruiting me, which is really awesome. And I, all of them right now are division one. Um, I don’t really have like a main place that I want to go. I’m definitely open to everything in all honestly just be like the best fit for me is where I would like to go. Um, this year was again a pivotal year and then this summer will be like a pivotal summer for me. So how I played there will depend on how, where I go and who I’ll get recruited by. Um, and then this my senior year, if I commit early, then it’ll probably just be like, um, a good senior year to meet, to like show off my platform and stuff like that. But if I commit later than my senior year will probably also be pivotal in my recruiting process and that will be like a good year for me to get myself out there even more.
And maybe more stressful to, you know, how you want to look at it. Um, you mentioned, so I’m curious, is the, is the EYBL um, that you talked about this summer, is that a really heavily recruited platform? I mean, way more than your high school season was?
Yes ma’am. So usually EYBL stands for elite youth basketball league and we’re sponsored by Nike and there’s only, I think 32 teams in the country that are selected you IBL platform and you go to these tournaments and you see like 20 to 30 coaches sitting at one court, like watching the game. And so it’s definitely very intense, very, very much like a business. Like everything there is business, you take care of business and you’ll, I mean it’s, it’s a lot, but it’s very fun and it’s good exposure and yeah.
Is it, I mean I assume that’s like you said, the business side of it and probably how you’re growing as a player on the court and then your school team would probably be a little bit more of the fun side of it and how you bond with your teammates off the court. Stuff’s assess your school. Is that how you see it too?
Um, I think for, for me, definitely anytime I step on the basketball court, it’s business. You never know who’s watching anything like that. Um, school basketball is definitely more, I think more of like a community kind of thing. Like the whole school’s watching you but your whole city’s kind of watching you.
That’s kind of like where it’s not fun but it’s more like enjoyable. I mean [inaudible] definitely enjoyable. You have like people that you connect with on your team, but it is definitely a lot of people have the same mindset as you where they all want to get recruited. They all want to play division one basketball. So it’s definitely a lot more like business like, and um, focus is, yes, yes ma’am. Yes ma’am. Laser focused on the game, I would, I would read. Yeah. Yeah.
Is there any chance you’d go to this same school where your sister is or will you be?
I actually, I could, I’m actually getting, my sister’s at Texas Tech right now and I am getting recruited by Texas Tech and that’s actually where both my parents went and like where my grandparents live. So of course, yes, everyone wants me to go there. So definitely a good year offer could tell him that just now it’s meant to be.
I didn’t even know you were going to say that. I’m a Red Raider and I followed my sister out there.
Oh my gosh.
And my, I met my husband there, so that’s really funny. Even though everybody listens to this podcast regularly knows I’m always talking about tech, so. Okay, well now I ha I know where to keep my fingers crossed. Very cool.
Thank you.
Glad I asked. So, yeah, I followed my sister out there, um, back in 1997 she was ahead of me. So, um, we went out and lived together. I mean, I know your, your space is out a little more in grade, so you wouldn’t be with her the whole time. But it was amazing. So I had a great classical, my sister. Yeah. Well thank you. I know it’s a weird time right now. Normally, you know, you’d be leaving a practice or something and meet me a studio. So I’m glad we still got to connect digitally and have a chat. So we’ll be following you and good luck on your, um, summer week and we’ll watch your senior year.
Thank you so much.
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