“Praise the Lord and Hook ‘em Horns,” star junior forward Madison Booker said as she exited the podium of Sunday’s press conference.
Although the line originally belongs to head coach Vic Schaefer, he simply smiled when asked about Booker adopting his outro following Texas’ dominant victory in the Southeastern Conference Championship.
“She can have it,” he responded.
Yet this wasn’t the first time that Schaefer had allowed Booker to take over the moment last weekend.
During Saturday’s tournament semifinal, the threat of an Ole Miss comeback loomed at the end of the third quarter, after the Rebels closed on a 9-0 run in the last 1:48 to cut their deficit to two.
As soon as the buzzer sounded, Booker, without hesitation, grabbed her teammates and put them into a huddle. Schaefer stood back and let her take vocal control.
“I’ve been trying to get her to be that voice for a while, and she’s taken this on here lately, which is great because that’s her next step, in my opinion,” Schaefer said. “I just let her have it. I let her have the huddle, and she did a great job.”
Booker led with positivity, encouraging her teammates to stay composed and aligned with the group’s mission. In regular-season play, the Longhorns had already been in a late-game, high-pressure dogfight with the Rebels — this was nothing new.
Her rallying of the team ultimately paid dividends. Texas dominated the final 10 minutes, outscoring the Rebels by 15 points. In fact, Booker’s quarter total matched that of Ole Miss’ altogether at 13 to culminate a historic 31-point, double-double performance.
Her elite basketball skillset is undeniable — Booker was recently awarded first-team All-American honors by USA Today, SEC Tournament Most Valuable Player and Associated Press National Player of the Week to add to her list of accolades.
“She’s just a special talent … God’s gift,” Ole Miss head coach Yolett McPhee-McCuin said about Booker.
Schaefer has also pushed her a step further to take on a captain-like ownership of the team’s energy, communication and accountability.
This was not something that came naturally to Booker. Back in October, she expressed that her preferred leading style comes in a one-on-one, personal setting, drawing from her mentorship of freshman guard Aaliyah Crump in the lead-up to the season.
Her mindset was to be an embodiment of the team standard, not through her words, but through her actions. She knew that her work ethic exemplifies to her teammates what is required to excel, even without constant vocal involvement.
Booker deferred to her veteran teammate when it came to being outspoken.
“Rori (Harmon) is more of the vocal one — she’s the leader of this team,” Booker said in October. “She gets a team going, she tells them what to do. I think my vocal role is (to) push people, motivate people. I keep their head up a little bit too, so I keep them going.”
But as her junior year has progressed, she has embraced a greater, more collective vocal responsibility, attempting to make uncomfortable leadership a more comfortable mindset.
The pinnacle of that development arrived against Ole Miss, when her guidance of the huddle proved to mark a crucial turning point in the contest. Booker no longer deferred to Harmon for strong leadership — instead, Harmon was beside her, the two serving as co-leaders of the unit.
This evolution within Booker’s basketball identity seems to have emerged at just the right time.
As the Longhorns now look to capitalize on their recent success to go all the way in the upcoming NCAA Tournament, strong leadership from the team’s experienced players is vital to making it through the trials and tribulations that come with the madness of March.
“I’m really proud of her,” Schaefer said. “Just seeing her whole maturation while she’s been here. It’s hard to believe she’s been here three years, (it’s) blown by. So that’s always a vision for her: not just adding to her game … but adding to her whole experience.”
