lynx/wnba

Nicky Anosike feels more grown up these days.

Anosike, the 6-2 rookie center for the Lynx, passed her driver's license test last month and is driving a Jeep Liberty the team loaned her.

"I felt like a kid before, asking people for rides," said Anosike, 22. "Now I can get myself to most places."

Anosike is also helping drive her new team to places it has not gone before. After back-to-back 10-victory seasons, Minnesota is the WNBA's last unbeaten team at 3-0. That's the best start in the 10-year history of the franchise.

Anosike is averaging 11 points and 4.3 rebounds as a starter. Two other rookies, Charde Houston (12 ppg) and Candice Wiggins (11.7), are averaging in double figures coming off the bench.

Minnesota will try to extend its winning streak against defending champion Phoenix (0-3) at 7 tonight at the Target Center.

Anosike, taken 16th overall in last month's WNBA draft, played collegiately at Tennessee, which won the NCAA championship the past two seasons. But scoring was a secondary role for her on the Vols, as evidenced by her career average of only 7.5 points.

After scoring 11 and 20 points in her first two games, Anosike was only 1-for-6 from the field Thursday. But her only basket was an 8-foot jumper with 1 minute, 26 seconds left that put the Lynx ahead to stay in a 75-69 victory at Chicago.

"[Anosike] is a fighter, and that rubs off on her teammates," Lynx coach Don Zierden said.

'Equal opportunity'

Anosike insisted she has the ability to score the day after the Lynx drafted her. She averaged 22.2 points as a high school senior at St. Peter's, an all-girls private school on Staten Island in New York City.

But Tennessee coach coach Pat Summitt wanted Anosike primarily to rebound and play defense for her talent-laden team.

"Now with coach Z, I'm in a system of equal opportunity," Anosike said. "We don't just give the ball to one person, and that's when you really can shine if you are on a real team."

Candace Parker, a rookie with Los Angeles, was the Vols' All-America player.

Anosike gives much of the credit for her becoming an WNBA starter to two women in her life: her mother, Ngozi, and Summitt.

Her mother, who immigrated from Nigeria at 18, is a single parent who raised eight children in a Staten Island project. Until she became a nurse at age 40, Ngozi usually worked several jobs interspersed with night classes. She was just as demanding of her children.

"We'd bring a test home with a 92 or 93," Nicky said, "and she would say, 'This is not good enough. You need a 100.' "

Summitt, like Mom, pushed her

Nicky, the youngest daughter, finished first in her class in eighth grade, and fifth academically at St. Peter's. She started playing basketball at age 9, and by fifth grade one of Nicky's coaches was telling Ngozi that her daughter could some day be a great player.

Mom was skeptical, but she appreciated what coaches and parents of teammates were doing: always picking Nicky up for games and practices despite her living in a neighborhood so tough that Ngozi would not allow her children to play outside.

The first time her mother saw Nicky play basketball was as a high school junior in a game she scored her 1,000th career point. Summitt was also present.

Nicky, a McDonald's high school All-America player, had her choice of colleges. Her mother had just one in mind.

"I kept my mouth shut," said Ngozi, "and prayed Nicky would go to Pat Summitt. She reminded me of myself, a very hard-working woman, very disciplined, very tough, always pushing her girls to bring out the best in them."

Mom was right about Summitt. She was tough, especially on Nicky. "I had to meet the highest standard on the team day in and day out," Nicky said. "Why she was so much harder on me, I could not understand it. But it was for my betterment. It's why I am starting now."

At Tennessee, Nicky became a leader. She authored a team pact two seasons ago which everyone signed. It committed everyone to giving everything they had on the court, no matter what, Anosike said.

"I know it helped," she said.

So she persuaded her teammates to sign another pact her senior year. Nicky completed a triple major in criminal justice, political science and legal studies in four years at Tennessee and had a 3.8 grade-point average. She graduated May 9.

Last week Summitt called Nicky and said she was proud of her.

"People look at me like, 'Oh my goodness, three majors -- you are crazy, just be happy with the one,' " Nicky said. "But you want to do the unthinkable, you want to go that extra step."