The women’s basketball game against Vanderbilt last year is something senior standout Angie Welle will always remember.

Welle scored 20 points and had seven rebounds in the Cyclones 84-65 season-ending loss in the Sweet Sixteen, but she wasn’t happy with the way she played.

“That was the one game where, for me, it was almost at the point where I was just kind of humiliated,” she said. “I just played horrible. We just were not clicking that game.”

Despite the disappointment, Welle said the game provided an extra spark heading into this season.

“That was my motivation all summer. You realize the fact that we had a chance, and we realize how much farther we have to get, and that they were probably a better team than we were,” she said. “I think that was definitely motivation for me this summer.”

Preseason honors have begun to pile up for the 6-foot-4-inch forward/center, but through it all, Welle has stayed humble.

“Sometimes, I think my name doesn’t really belong in there. I don’t know what’s going on there,” she said. “I think it just gives a lot of credit to our team.”

Welle’s stats don’t agree with her assessment.

She’s done plenty to earn the honors averaging 18.3 points and 10.1 rebounds per game last season while shooting nearly 74 percent from the field. But more important to Welle is the team’s success.

“You look at the people that are on [the preseason lists], and they are people whose teams have been really successful,” she said. “It’s a nice honor, but you can’t put a lot into it. You just have to play the game.”

Going into her senior year, Welle’s not content with where her game is at, an aspect her coach said makes her such a good player.

“The thing about Angie that to me is probably the most dramatic is that she’s never satisfied with where she is,” head coach Bill Fennelly said. “She’s somebody that wants to be good and understands that you got to keep working at it.

Welle said she works hard each year to upgrade her game, but that she knows there’s always something she should be working on.

“I say it every year, but I’d like to be more of a threat from away from the basket,” she said. “And then, maybe not even from a basketball standpoint, I think just having more patience. I’m going to have to be able to recognize when double teams come, things like that, just try to be a smarter player overall.”

This Summer, Welle took a big step in her development as a basketball player. She spent time in Europe as a member of the Big 12 All-Star team. The team played five games during the tour, winning all five.

“From a basketball standpoint, I think it might of been one of the best experiences I’ve ever had. Just because I was playing with people that I’ve never played with before,” she said. “It’s easy to go over to Europe, like we did after my freshman year, and play with people I’m comfortable with, people I knew, but this was like I was going to be playing for two weeks with people I’ve never met. I think it was one of the best experiences I’ve ever had.”

Welle’s looking forward to her senior season, and with a number of younger players on the roster, she has taken on a new role this season – the role of a mentor.

“She is an amazing teacher,” newcomer Lisa Kriener said. “She doesn’t even have to tell me anything. It’s just what she does, how she moves, just how she plays. Being in contact with her has really taught me a lot. She’s just awesome.”

Fennelly said part of the teaching aspect comes with Welle’s personality while the other part lies in the fact that she’s a senior wanting to go out the right way.

“I think she’s somebody that understands that there’s some responsibility with being a senior on a good team with a lot of preseason hype,” he said.”In my experience, seniors go one of two ways. They kind of coast in and put in their time or they dig in deep …Whatever they’ve got left they give, there’s nothing left in the tank at the end, and I think that’s the way Angie approaches her senior year. She wants to be a good player.”

And with Welle’s work ethic, Fennelly said the future looks bright.

“She’ll be a first round draft choice in the WNBA,” he said. “There’s a lot of things ahead of that kid that can be positive. She just keeps working at it, and that’s the great thing about her.”