On Thursday, April 14, John Brown University head women’s basketball coach Jeff Soderquist announced the members of his latest recruiting class. The Golden Eagles will enter the 2022-23 season with three newcomers on the roster, two of them being transfers. Bella Irlenborn and Maci Mains head to Siloam Springs with prior playing experience at the collegiate level, while Nadia Akbar joins the program as the lone incoming freshman.
Nadia Akbar comes to JBU after finishing her playing career at Bentonville High School. Akbar was a strong contributor to Bentonville’s 2020 state championship team, along with Irlenborn. Akbar missed her senior season due to a knee injury, though she showed great all-around ability in prior seasons, putting together solid performances on both ends of the floor. Akbar also proved herself to be a threat on the glass, which Soderquist highlighted as a big need heading into next season.
“Nadia is a strong physical wing player that we need to be able to drive and finish and help us with rebounding,” Soderquist said.
Prior to coming to JBU, Irlenborn played at Bentonville High School, where she helped lead the Tigers to back-to- back 6A West conference titles and a state championship run in 2020. Following this, she played two seasons at Southwest Baptist University, a NCAA Division II school located in Bolivar, Mo. She played in 14 games and averaged six points and seven rebounds per 40 minutes played. Irlenborn, standing at 6’2”, will be looked upon, according to Coach Soderquist, to provide depth “at the forward/post position, which we need.”
Maci Mains comes to John Brown after spending four seasons in Arkadelphia, Ark. playing for Henderson State University, another NCAA DII school. Mains led the team in scoring during the COVID-shortened 2020-21 season with 15.4 points per game in 13 appearances. Her efforts from that season were rewarded with a unanimous All- Great American Conference First-Team Selection. Her numbers took a dip last season, where she was primarily utilized off the bench as a role player, though she still shot 40% from three-point range. Mains now provides Coach Soderquist with another skilled shooter in his arsenal, joining Natalie Smith and Maddie Altman, who finished first and second in the Sooner Athletic Conference in three-point percentage last season. Soderquist sees Mains being an immediate fit, saying that, “She has a lot of experience, and I think she is a guard that fits into our system.”
Speaking on utilizing transfers in this year’s class, Soderquist notes having players on the roster with prior collegiate experience as key, especially when looking at the team’s need for depth heading into the upcoming season.
“I think both of their experience will help us,” Soderquist said. “We needed to add some more depth, and then to have that depth have college experience is just huge.”
Another key component of this recruiting class is that all of the players are local talent that spent their high school playing careers in Northwest Arkansas. The roster now contains four former Bentonville Tigers (Irlenborn, Akbar, Natalie Smith and Emily Sanders), while Maci Mains played for Har-Ber, another 6A West school. Soderquist highlighted this possible degree of familiarity that these players have with each other’s abilities as a potential strength.
“I think anytime you can have local talent that is really good for a program,” Soderquist said. “We knew Maci and Belle very well coming out of high school, and they knew us. So, I think when the option was there they knew they wanted to come.”
All three will look to factor into the rotation on a Golden Eagles team that brings back almost all of its key contributors from last season’s team, including WBCA- NAIA All-America Honorable Mention Tarrah Stephens. There will be a lot of mouths for Coach Soderquist to feed when it comes to playing time next season, but Soderquist is confident that all three will be able to find their place.
“[We] have to get them in and start working them into our system and see how they pick it up,” Soderquist noted, adding that, ultimately, “I think all three will fit into the rotation next season.”