Indiana

Who Compares? Top Three Ex-Indiana Players Who Produced Like Sydney Parrish

Published

1 year ago

September 3, 2024

Who Compares? Top Three Ex-Indiana Players Who Produced Like Sydney Parrish

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. – It has no doubt been said before, but still worth noting, that one of the best traits Indiana women’s basketball coach Teri Moren has in building her teams is the versatility of each player.

This really comes into focus in the comparison series when you see just how skilled today’s Indiana players are versus their predecessors.

That’s not meant to be a knock on Indiana players of the past. They did what they were asked to do. Roles were more defined in pre-2010s basketball.

When you have a player like Sydney Parrish – the subject of today’s comparison series – and try to compare her scoring, rebounding, passing and defensive skills? You realize what kind of golden age Indiana’s women’s basketball finds itself in given her diverse talents.

What’s fascinating about Parrish is that if you expand her criteria to include forwards who were 6-foot-2 or shorter, Parrish has characteristics that match both her listed guard spot and forward. She matches quite a few former Hoosiers. Twenty-two in all fit the bill.

When you get into the finer details? That’s when the sheer across-board excellence of the current players like Parrish can really be appreciated. There may be a lot of matches for her scoring and win shares, but not many that match everything she can do.

Here’s our stab at finding Indiana players of the past who produced like Parrish.

Tale of the tape

Parrish’s traditional statistics: 10.8 points, 6 rebounds and 2.3 assists. She converted 45.3% of her shots and 40% of her 3-point attempts. She is listed at 6-foot-2.

Parrish’s advanced statistics, as used by sports-reference.com: Parrish had 3.3 win shares and a 21.6 Player Efficiency Rating. She had a 19.6% usage percentage, a 14.1% assist percentage, a 13% total rebounding percentage and a 4.4 defensive box plus-minute rating.

Some of the advanced statistics are explained below.

Honorable mention

Worth naming in this space is Rainey Alting ’01. It’s a shame advanced statistics aren’t available for her season. Her scoring stats (8.8 ppg) are barely in-range of Parrish, but when you look at her shooting (45.5%, 40% 3-point) and assist (2.5 apg) numbers? You wonder. However, Alting was 5-foot-5, so that’s one disqualifier to make the top three.

Dawn Douglas ’93 is a close match for Parrish’s traditional stats at 10.1 points, 5.1 rebounds and 2.3 assists, but she did not shoot threes, a glaring difference.

Jamie Braun ’10, Whitney Lindsay ’11, Hope Elam ’11 and Alexis Gassion ’17 all have certain numbers that line up well, but not enough to make the top three.

Same for the recent Moren players. Al Patberg ’22 and the inevitable Grace Berger ’23. Both close, but none quite there to make the top three.

3. Tabitha Gerardot ‘14

Indiana guard Tabitha Gerardot handles the ball in a game at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall against Saint Louis. / Indiana athletics

Gerardot was a 6-foot-1 forward on Curt Miller’s last Indiana team, a transfer from Valparaiso. Her scoring would seem to disqualify her. Gerardot averaged just 8.7 points in her only Indiana season.

However, advanced stats demonstrate how close their games were.

Gerardot had 3.1 win shares, a 13.4% rebounding percentage and a 19.8% usage percentage, all within a fraction of Parrish’s numbers. She’s also close to Parrish in size, so she made the cut.

2. Nicole Cardaño-Hillary ‘22

Indiana’s Nicole Cardano Hillary (4) looks to pass during the second half of the Indiana versus Princeton women’s NCAA second round game at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall on Monday, March 21, 2022. / Rich Janzaruk/Herald-Times / USA TODAY NETWORK

Given the interchangeable traits that Moren players tend to have, a recent player needed to be included, so we went with the Spanish standout.

Her traditional numbers line up closely. She averaged 11.6 points, 4.9 rebounds and 3.1 assists during her senior season. Parrish is a better shooter, but not by a wide margin. Cardaño -Hillary converted 40.7% overall and 35.7% from 3-point range.

The pair are close in advanced stats, too. Cardaño-Hillary had 3.8 win shares and a close usage rate of 21.4%.

Cardaño-Hillary was also one of the few players who had a superior defensive box plus-minus rating than Parrish’s stout 4.4 as Cardaño -Hillary reached 5.5 in 2022.

1. Lisa Eckart ‘03

A headshot of Lisa Eckart from her Indiana career. / Indiana University archives

The Greenwood, Ind., native only played one year at Indiana after she transferred from Evansville, but her numbers are very close to what Parrish produced.

One of three double-digit scorers on the 2003 team (which also produced the top comparable for Yarden Garzon – Jenny DeMuth), Eckart averaged 11.1 points, 6.4 rebounds and 1.6 assists. The scoring is very close to Parrish. Eckart enjoys the rebounding advantage; Parrish has the edge in assists.

Eckart, a 6-foot forward, also converted 38.1% of her 3-point shots, a rare forward from that era who had that skill set.

The advanced stats also show similarities. Eckart’s rebounding percentage is 11% to Parrish’s 13%, and their assist percentage (14.1 % for Parrish, 13.4% for Eckart) also makes the two a good comparison.

Rules

First, the basic rules. Players will only be compared to those who played roughly the same position.

There’s some leeway granted to shooting guards, whether they also handled the ball or whether they were big and could play small forward. Same for power forwards, some of whom are stretch forwards, others have manned the post.

This rule is important: players are only compared to those who were the same class. Seniors-to-seniors, juniors-to-juniors, etc.

With redshirt seasons, and particularly as it relates to current players, COVID-19 amnesty seasons, some current seniors can only be compared to seniors who exhausted their eligibility in their own period of time. Xavier Johnson had three senior seasons thanks to his injury waiver season – a true man of the times.

Criteria

Current Indiana players were compared to players of the past in three different categories – traditional statistics, advanced statistics and role.

One fundamental issue is that advanced statistics are only available starting in the mid-1990s – and that’s only the most basic ones. The full menu of advanced statistics we have today were only tracked starting in the 2009-10 season.

Even the full menu of traditional statistics weren’t accurately tracked until the 1980s.

Traditional counting stats and advanced stats create differences in comps. Traditional stats are subject to minutes played.

Players were considered a “comp” if they were within two points per game in scoring or within one win share in advanced statistics.

After that, the other statistics were used to form a close comparison. A good comp also needs to be roughly the same size, though that is difficult as players have steadily grown over time. Bill Garrett was a 6-foot-3 post player in the early 1950s, for example.

Ratings explained

Win shares: An estimate of the number of wins contributed by a player via their offense and defense. The higher the number, the better.

Player Efficiency Rating: A rating created by John Hollinger in an attempt to quantify a player’s overall contribution. An average rating is 15.

Usage Percentage: An estimate of the percentage of team plays used by a player when they’re on the floor.

Assist percentage: An estimate of the percentage of teammate field goals a player assisted on where they were on the floor.

Total rebounding percentage: An estimate of the available rebounds a player grabbed when they were on the floor.

Defensive box plus-minus: A box score estimate of the defensive points per 100 possessions a player contributed to above a league-average player. The higher the number, the better.

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Indiana

Indiana Pacers Must Manage Two-Way Contract Player Availability Down Stretch

Published

5 hours ago

March 1, 2026

Press Room

Indiana Pacers Must Manage Two-Way Contract Player Availability Down Stretch

NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA – DECEMBER 20: Ethan Thompson #55 of the Indiana Pacers takes a shot over Derik Queen #22 of the New Orleans Pelicans during the second half of a game at Smoothie King Center on December 20, 2025 in New Orleans, Louisiana. (Photo by Tyler Kaufman/Getty Images)

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WASHINGTON – The Indiana Pacers have a player availability puzzle to put together down the stretch of the 2025-26 season, and it involves all three of their players on two-way contracts.

Currently, the Pacers have Jalen Slawson, Ethan Thompson, and Taelon Peter signed to two-way deals. Thompson and Peter have been helpful at different points this season, and all three players are healthy right now. They each project to have a bigger role in the Pacers’ final outings of the season.

But they can’t all play in every game thanks to two-way contract rules, and the Pacers will have to juggle the availability of each player. Indiana has already played multiple games since the All-Star break with just one or two or their two-way contract signees available to play.

That’s because two-way agreements come with a limit – players on such contracts can only be active in 50 games per season (or a proportionate ratio of 50/82 games at the time of signing based on the number of days left in the season). The Pacers couldn’t get by without their two-way contract players at various moments this season due to injuries, with Peter being active for 23 of the team’s first 25 games and Thompson during every game from December 1 through January 17.

During those stretches, Indiana needed their two-way players to field a team or a rotation that actually made sense. It wasn’t a poor use of their active days. But that two-way usage early in the season now requires the Pacers to be strategic down the stretch of 2025-26. They have 22 more games this season but won’t be able to use their two-way talents in all of them.

Peter, a rookie selected in the second round of last June’s NBA Draft, had a rush of games to open the campaign, and he’s allowed to suit up 14 more times this league year. “He’s figuring out what being a professional basketball player is about,” Pacers head coach Rick Carlisle said of Peter and his in-season growth earlier this month. “It’s about being who you are all the time, regardless of make or miss. Just keep playing, just keep staying aggressive.”

Thompson was signed on November 30, which permitted him to appear in 39 games this season. He’s only got 10 left – Thompson was effective right away with the Pacers and played often after his signing. He was named to the NBA G League Next Up game, effectively the G League All-Star game, for his performances this campaign.

INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA – OCTOBER 13: Taelon Peter #4 of the Indiana Pacers takes a shot against the San Antonio Spurs at Bankers Life Fieldhouse on October 13, 2025 in Indianapolis, Indiana. (Photo by Justin Casterline/Getty Images)

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Slawson signed his contract earlier today and is eligible for 13 appearances the rest of the way for the Pacers. So, with 22 games remaining, none of the team’s two-way contract players can be active for each remaining game. The team will have to figure out the best strategy when it comes to managing two-way player availability during the final months of the season.

Another consideration for the franchise is that two-way players, by virtue of their contract, can be transferred down to the G League at any time. Peter, Slawson, and Thomspon have combined for 64 appearances with Indiana’s G League affiliate team, the Noblesville Boom, this season. Once the Boom’s season ends – their final scheduled game is March 26 but the team currently holds a playoff spot – then the G League is not an option for two-way players.

So the Pacers have to figure out the best way to deploy, and evaluate, their two-way contract signees during March and April. It’s a lot to manage.

“We’re trying to save games for him,” Carlisle said of the Pacers decision to keep Quenton Jackson, who was previously on a two-way contract, inactive for a game earlier this month. “We want to conserve those games as much as possible.”

Jackson had his contract converted from a two-way deal to a standard deal earlier today, and Slawson filled his two-way slot. It was sharp business for the Pacers, but they lost some available two-way days as a result – Jackson had more than 13 games remaining, but Slawson gets fewer because of the day he signed his contract.

“Two-way guys, your life is a lot of unpredictability of where you’re going to be from day to day,” Pacers general manager Chad Buchanan shared in February.

If the Pacers want to keep their two-way talents around the NBA club as much as possible, their best course of action could be to keep two of the three active in every game and occasionally just have one of the three available. If the team can get to a spot in which they have 15 games left on the schedule and all of their two-way talents have 10+ games left in which they could be active, two of the three could play every night during the final 15 outings. Using all three at once could be difficult, though Indiana may choose to deploy each of Thompson, Peter, and Slawson on the second night of back-to-backs as they manage injuries down the stretch. Putting any of the trio in the G League for a few days is an option, too, but comes with injury risks.

Slawson has not appeared in a game for the Pacers yet this season. Peter is averaging 3.3 points per game while shooting 35.8% from the field while Thompson is posting 4.9 points per contest and knocking down 36.7% of his shots. The Pacers are 15-45 with three back-to-backs remaining and three games left against teams near them in the inverse standings.

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Indiana Pacers To Add Wing Jalen Slawson Via A Two-Way Contract

Published

17 hours ago

February 28, 2026

Press Room

Indiana Pacers To Add Wing Jalen Slawson Via A Two-Way Contract

Indiana Pacers’ Jalen Slawson dribbles during the second half of an NBA preseason basketball game against the Oklahoma City Thunder, Saturday, Oct. 11, 2025, in Indianapolis. (AP Photo/Darron Cummings)

INDIANAPOLIS – The Indiana Pacers plan to sign wing Jalen Slawson to a two-way contract. The 26-year old forward has spent the ongoing campaign with the Pacers G League affiliate franchise, the Noblesville Boom. It’s a one-year pact covering the rest of the 2025-26 season.

Slawson was a second-round pick back in 2023 and spent his rookie season with the Sacramento Kings. That campaign, the Furman product appeared in 12 games and averaged 0.7 points and 0.6 rebounds per game. Since then, he has bounced around between the Orlando Magic and Pacers organizations.

Most of Slawson’s time in the pros has come via the G League. With the Kings and Magic affiliate teams, the forward averaged between 12 and 13 points per game while being a solid passer and rebounder for his position.

That got him a training camp invite with Indiana last fall. Slawson spent all of the 2025 preseason on an Exhibit 10 deal with the Pacers, and he appeared in all four of the team’s tune-up games ahead of the regular season. He averaged 2.8 points and 3.5 rebounds per game.

Slawson was waived just before the regular season, but the Pacers affiliate team owned his G League rights, and he’s spent the entire season with the Noblesville Boom. That’s where the 6-foot-7 forward has popped – he’s averaging G League career highs of 19.2 points and 5.4 assists per game for the Boom this season, including an improved 34.7% three-point percentage.

MINNEAPOLIS, MINNESOTA – OCTOBER 7: Jules Bernard #14 of the Minnesota Timberwolves dribbles the ball against Jalen Slawson #18 of the Indiana Pacers during the second half of the preseason game at Target Center on October 7, 2025 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. (Photo by Stephen Maturen/Getty Images)

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He’s been among Noblesville’s best players this year, and with the team losing many players to injury or overseas opportunities, he has recently become the G League’ club’s top option. Even with more responsibility and attention, Slawson has continued to produce.

Now, he gets a call up to the Pacers via a two-way contract. He’s eligible to be active for 13 of the Pacers final 22 games – two-way contract players are only able to appear in a maximum of 50 games in a league year, and that ratio of games gets prorated if they are signed mid-season.

Pacers head coach Rick Carlisle had good memories of Slawson’s play for Indiana during the preseason. “ I think he’s an NBA player,” Carlisle said. “He’s had a good year with the Boom and this will be a great opportunity for him to play some games.”

Two-way contracts provide a salary that is half of the NBA’s rookie minimum, which would equate to $636k over the course of a full season. Prorated for the current day on the calendar, that means Slawson will make about $161k on his two-way with Indiana the rest of the season.

Two-way deals have no impact on a team’s salary cap, so the Pacers have no changes to their spending reality. They opened up a two-way spot by converting the contract of Quenton Jackson earlier this weekend.

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