JJ Quinerly wrapping up an impressive junior season at West Virginia – Blue Gold Sports

It was no secret heading into the season that JJ Quinerly was West Virginia Women’s Basketball’s top player. After all, she was a unanimous All-Big 12 selection the season prior.

This season, she is having arguably her best season to date. Her performance has had her named to multiple watchlists, including a candidate for the Ann Meyers Drysdale Award, the Naismith Defensive Player of the Year Watchlist, and the Ann Meyers Drysdale National Player of the Year Award Watchlist.

She is averaging a couple of career highs, including minutes with 30.9 per game, in points with 19.6 per game, and in steals with 3.1 per game. Her points per game are good enough to rank her 27th nationally, with her steals per game ranking 10th.

Quinerly has scored at least 10 points in all but one game this season, and her best individual performance in that category came when she scored 33 points in a loss to Baylor last Saturday.

“The kid is such a competitor, such a competitor,” head coach Mark Kellogg said after that game.

It is worth noting that Quinerly has played for a different coach each season she has been at West Virginia. She first played at West Virginia under Mike Carey, then opted to stay around when Dawn Plitzuweit was brought in, and now Kellogg is in as West Virginia’s head coach.

Quinerly spoke to the media earlier this season and talked about what it has been like to play for current coach Kellogg.

“He’s actually a pretty great coach,” Quinerly said. “I put a lot of trust into him when he came to this school and he’s taken us a pretty long way for it to be the start of the season, so I’m gonna continue to trust him and the other coaches too.”

Kellogg has helped the Mountaineers sit at 22-6 on the season, their first such season with at least 22 wins since 2020-21. He has also helped players such as Quinerly improve statistically.

Quinerly still has the regular season finale on Saturday and the postseason to continue adding to her impressive stats. She hopes to bring home some more hardware when it is all said and done at the end of the season.