STORRS — Every team needs one of a certain type of player, that youthful, exuberant type with a little dash of brash.
KK Arnold has been that player for the UConn women’s basketball team the last couple of years, but she’s outgrowing that role, a junior now, more mature, a national champ, (a little) more reserved, (a little) less TikTok time, developing into a team leader.
Well, brace yourself. “Big Fish has arrived.”
“I said, ‘Who calls you that other than you?’” Geno Auriemma said, feigning annoyance. ” … We should call her guppy.”
So this is the summer’s fish story at UConn. Kelis Fisher, 5 foot 9 freshman from Baltimore has done a cannonball dive into her sport’s biggest pond.
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“It’s a family nickname, it kind of got passed down to me,” Fisher said. “Everybody started calling me ‘Big Fish,’ not ‘the little one,’ and I just went with it and I like it.”
The original? “My father,” she said. “But he’s no longer Big Fish, it’s me. He could be like ‘King Fish’ or something. I’m Big Fish.”
By this time, a minute or so into Fisher’s first meeting with state reporters on Thursday, she had drawn a crowd. Arnold, Azzi Fudd and Kayleigh Heckel had formed a peanut gallery behind the scrum, arms folded. Loose cannon alert at the Werth Center, Arnold recording.
“You gotta earn ‘Big Fish,’” Arnold said. “You’re a guppy.”
“You’re messy,”Fisher responded. That’s social media slang for stirring up drama.
Fisher and Arnold have been matchup up a lot in the pickup games, apparently with wisdom mixed in with the light-hearted smack talk.
“She’s giving me a lot of advice,” Fisher said. “Telling me what she’s seeing, tips on what I should do on certain plays, I definitely love her and she’ll be there for me.”
Fisher committed to UConn as a high school sophomore; she was building a reputation at IMG Academy in Bradenton, Fla. She’s been in big ponds before, with USA Basketball, or at Overtime Select, a showcase for top recruits last September, where she had 31 points, 11 rebounds in a game.
“I’m really energetic, passionate about what I do,” Fisher said. “Speed, transition, I’m always about my teammates, when I’m with them I’m happy. Energetic. Sometimes I can’t control my energy.”
Auriemma, who urges freshmen to play to the strengths that got them to UConn, often admonishes Fisher to use her speed. “‘Get the ball and go,’ he says,” Fisher said. “He hates when I jog it up the floor.”
UConn’s freshmen are quite a contrast. Blanca Quinonez, now playing in Italy, will arrive soon. Gandy Malou-Mamel, forward from Limerick, Ireland, is “18 going on 32,” Auriemma said. She chooses her words carefully, but she’s all in on “Big Fish.”
“I defend her name,” Malou-Mamel said. “Coach Geno keeps saying she’s not Big Fish, she’s little fish in a pond, but I defend that name. She is Big Fish. Her personality is big, so she is Big Fish.”
Freshmen have to stick together. Roomies? Another story. Fisher is rooming with junior Ashlynn Shade and senior Caroline Ducharme.
“Well, she’s a gup-gup,” Shade said. “I just like to mess with her. She loves ‘Big Fish,’ but we just like to joke. She’s a big ball of energy. It’s fun to have her around, she adds a little liveliness to me and Caroline’s apartment, because we’re laid back and chill. She definitely has that young energy. She’s awesome. She is like a high-schooler, still. KK knows her chill time, but Kelis is always ‘go, go, go.’”
Things are a little different around the program this summer. The 12th national championship has brought the swagger back, and with players who are back from injuries, playing out extra eligibility, transferring in, the roster is 15-deep and freshmen are going to have to develop out of the spotlight the outset of their careers, wait and earn their turn.
For Fisher, who idolized the great UConn players growing up, this is the place she wanted to be and it’s all good.
“I want to learn from (the veterans) because they’ve been here for a minute,” Fisher said. “I’m competing, working, my time will come when it comes.”
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A way for Will Levis
Will Levis has had two seasons to establish himself as an NFL quarterback, though the upheaval of the Tennessee Titans, which has included head coaching and coordinator turnover, has not made that easy. Now that they got Cam Ward with the No.1 pick in the draft, turnover is coming, too.
Levis, from Madison and Xavier High in Middletown, is rolling with it.
“I think anyone who’s ever been in my situation can agree that it sucks,” Levis said during a recent Titans minicamp. “I’m just trying to do everything I can not to let it affect me. I’m just being the same dude every day in the building and being here for the guys.”
Levis, a second-round pick in 2023, was 2-10 as the starter last season, an 81.4 quarterback rating, 63.1 completion for 2,109 yards, 13 touchdowns and 12 interceptions. Another team might give him more time to develop, but Tennessee couldn’t pass up Ward with that pick.
So Levis is doing all he’s asked, putting in extra time on his footwork, taking reps at Tight End University, the smart things to do. He could get a few starts before the Titans believe Ward is ready, or Levis could be traded to a team with uncertainty at the position, with an older starter that needs a younger backup. The Steelers, maybe?
“I don’t plan on shifting my mindset at all, regardless of what the situation is,” Levis told reporters in Nashville. “I’m just going to be ready to play quarterback whenever my name’s called.”
Sunday short takes
*With their recent success, the state college women’s hockey programs had some cause for celebration at this week’s Professional Women’s Hockey League draft. Quinnipiac had four players among the 48 selected, included Kendall Cooper, taken sixth overall by the champion Minnesota Frost, Maya Labad (Montreal), Maddy Samoskevich (Vancouver) and Kaley Doyle (New York) all went in the fifth round. UConn had two players picked, Ava Rinker (Minnesota) and Jada Habisch (Seattle), in the fourth round. Yale’s Anna Bargman went in the fifth round to New York.
*Dana Smith, who played at Wheeler School in Plainville and helped Trinity reach the D-III Final Four in 2024, was part of the Thunder’s NBA championship effort as a video analyst.
Why Sunday could be the end of UConn women’s basketball’s regular-season series with South Carolina
*The pause, or end, of the UConn vs. South Carolina women’s basketball regular-season series is collateral damage from expanding conferences and conference schedules. These, however, are extremely consequential games on several levels. Tough loss all the way around.
*Bloomfield’s Mark Coley II, an outfielder, has reached Double A in the Marlins’ organization. He’s hitting .236 with a homer, 20 RBI and 14 steals in 50 games for Pensacola.
*Lefty Josh Simpson, from Stafford High, debuted in the majors with the Marlins last week and has stuck around. On Thursday, he was credited with a win in his third appearance, as the Marlins beat the Giants.
*Another lefty, UHart’s Sean Newcomb, 32, who has resurfaced in MLB with Oakland, pitched three scoreless innings out of the bullpen against the Yankees Friday night. Timing matters; lots of teams look for experienced lefty relievers at the trade deadline.
*Righty Pat Gallagher, who pitched at UConn, has been in Hartford this week as the Blue Jays promoted him to Double A New Hampshire. Also in Double A, with the Twins, ex-Husky Kyler Fedko hit two homers, including a grand slam, for Wichita on Friday. He has 16 homers.
*Whenever I hear Royals rookie Jac Caglianone mentioned on TV or radio, I’m tempted to file an MSR, missing syllables report. (Some Italians in my life insist it should be “Cal-i-a-known” or “Cag-li-a-known,” not “Cag-lee-own.”) But but it’s Jac’s name, and to each his Caglianone.
*Shabazz Napier and Niels Giffey, teammates on UConn’s 2011 and 2014 national champs, teamed up for another title, helping FCB Bayern Munich clinch the title in Germany. Napier, finals MVP, scored 15, Giffey seven in the deciding 81-77 win over Ulm.
*Ashlynn Shade is a big golf fan and reveled in the chance to go to the Travelers Championship. “I’m a big Scottie Scheffer fan,” she said. “He’s just amazing.”
*When home in Dallas, Ashley Elsey, whose son, UConn’s Liam McNeeley, drafted by the Hornets this week, closely follows the Wings and Paige Bueckers. “We’re just so proud of Paige,” she said. On Friday, Bueckers was the first player in WNBA history to get more than 25 points, five assists without a turnover.
*Referee Josh Tiven 47, a Waterford native and Ledyard High grad, was on the whistle for Game 7 of the NBA Finals. If you didn’t know that, he must’ve done a heck of a job.
*How old am I? Here I’ve been getting “dapped up” and “ghosted” for years, and just this week figured out what those terms mean.
*The TV camera shot from behind the 18th tee at the Travelers, with people crowded on the ground, on the hill, on the balconies and in the grandstands, looked like players walking into a sold out Madison Square Garden.
Dom Amore: In dramatic Travelers finish, Keegan Bradley, Captain America, was Captain Clutch
Last word
Class, decorum and sportsmanship are dying arts these days, becoming rare enough that we should take a paragraph to laud a couple of competitors at the Travelers. Russell Henley saw his ball move ever so slightly on a back swing in the second round and reported it, assessing himself a penalty stroke that could have made an enormous monetary difference if he stayed in contention on the final day. Then after Tommy Fleetwood’s painful-to-watch fade on Sunday, he handled the post-round interviews with the utmost class and dignity. You kind of hope that first PGA win comes sooner than later.