Confidence is a funny little thing to figure out. An abundance of it can make some think they are rulers of the free world while a lack of confidence can make a minimal task seem insurmountable.

Confidence can come and go with the miss of a basket or the sinking of a game-winner, but for senior forward Lesley Juedes, confidence in her game came about out of necessity.

"The team lost three great seniors last season and Katie (O'Grady) and Kelly (Schwerman) were great shooters, so I think my teammates looked for me to step in and fill that role," Juedes said.

Confidence has gone hand-in-hand with success for Juedes this season; the 6-1 senior forward from Ripon currently owns a team-best .420 3-point field goal percentage for the Golden Eagles (11-5, 2-1) and is fifth on the team in scoring. Juedes' play this season is a dramatic change, but head coach Terri Mitchell felt a change in Juedes' confidence during last season helped her become a better player this season.

"Last season Lesley started in the playing group and she was out of the playing group by mid-season," Mitchell said. "That was the biggest decision-making part of her progress, deciding whether she was going to bail or stick with it, and she stuck with it. She worked even harder to get herself back into a playing group at a critical time of the year when we went on our run."

Juedes has done a majority of her scoring outside the 3-point line, taking over for Schwerman as the team's main 3-point threat. Compared to last season, in which Juedes hit only five 3-point field goals, the senior forward has increased that number six-fold, tallying 29 through the first three Conference USA games.

Juedes attributes her 3-point success this season to last summer. She feels that being with her teammates and working on drills the coaches improved her play.

"The team stays all summer and plays together every day," Juedes said. "A lot of us come in together and we work on our shooting together. We do all sorts of drills that the coaches give us, things that we want to improve on."

Juedes earned a C-USA Player of the Week Award for her efforts against DePaul on Jan. 9. Against the Blue Demons, Juedes scored a career-high 21 points, was 5-for-9 from 3-point range and 4-for-4 from the free throw line.

Besides the accolades this season has brought, assistant coach Michelle Nason feels Juedes' ability to shoot has created opportunities for other players on the team.

"Her ability to shoot opens things up for other players immensely," Nason said.

"Last year when Kelly Schwerman went into a slump everyone was playing a zone against us and was packing it inside. I don't want to say they disrespected us, but they came into games with a proven mentality.

"Now people are scouting us and they're saying, 'When Juedes is in the game, she's a 3-point shooting threat.' It opens up the driving lanes for Carolyn Kieger and it opens up the paint for Christina Quaye," Nason added.

Juedes' progress this season has made opposing coaching staffs worry about an outside offensive threat from the Golden Eagles, but it has also brought out a sense of pride from Mitchell.

"We are so proud of her because Lesley has so much fight and passion about her play on the court right now," Mitchell said. "She has taken the last three years of her experience, of playing and not playing and she has taken all of that and is now on the court with more confidence than ever before."

This year Juedes has already surpassed her minutes played from last season by 138. An extreme increase in minutes might worry some coaches, but Nason has a different spin on it.

"We only have five weeks left of the season after this weekend," Nason said. "She is a senior and she sees the writing on the wall that 'this is it for me' and I expect her to keep playing hard while looking for more shots until the end of the year."

This weekend Juedes takes her 8.3 points per game average on the road with the Golden Eagles, who face Southern Miss on Friday and Tulane on Sunday.

Southern Miss enters Friday's game with a record of 6-10 and 1-3 in C-USA. Led by freshman Shannon Stueber, Southern Miss has three players in double-digit scoring for the season.

The Green Wave head into two games this weekend with an overall record of 8-9 and are currently 0-4 in C-USA. Senior Lakethia Hampton is the Green Wave's leading scorer, averaging 18.8 points per game.

This article appeared in The Marquette Tribune on Jan. 20 2005.