Greencastle, Ind. - Having started playing basketball at age three, Mya Shannon put together an impressive career in basketball from high school to her collegiate career at DePauw. Between 2018-2023, Shannon averaged 20 points a game and was a part of two conference championship teams. Looking back on her career, being an athlete was never a question to Shannon, it was about finding the right fit.

"I would say I was kind of born into it. My dad was a big athlete, so there was really never any question what I was going to do. I was always going to be an athlete, to some degree or another. And I played all the sports growing up, and it really came down to where my best fit was for college when I got to that point, and that ended up being basketball, and that ended up being DePauw." Shannon said.

Immediately DePauw stood out to Shannon with a combination of appealing aspects, including the coaching.

"Coach Huffman was a big draw to get there. I also really liked coach AB [Annie Bourne] and then Cam, who was there at the time." Shannon said, "But the biggest draw for DePauw was the idea that you can be a successful athlete as well as a successful student, and have a social life, and you could really experience everything that college had to offer. And it was really nice that that's actually what happened."

Even though there were four coaches at the time for Shannon to learn from, she found that they balanced each other out when approaching basketball, but still remained supportive along the way.

"All four of them were so different, and how they supported us, and how they showed up for us. Coach Huffman, is obviously fantastic, but she was so tough, and we worked so hard for her, but we also knew that she was gonna support us off the court, and we knew that she was just gonna be there for us as human beings as well, which I think is really difficult to do." Shannon said.

Shannon has a lot of fond memories of her time on the team, and there were moments where the support of more than just her teammates and friends was impressionable on her experience.

"My sophomore year. We hosted the first two rounds of the NCAA tournament, and the turnout in the gym was absolutely insane. There's a picture of the entire student section being full. Like, I just got goosebumps thinking about it. The atmosphere that we got to play in for those two games was unreal." Shannon said.

Shannon stressed the importance of close support and showing up for other sports as a way to show the connection between athletes and sports on campus.

"I had a lot of other athletes that were my friends, and their teams would all come and support us, and we would go to their games. It was a lot of fun, and I made a lot of good friends through it." Shannon said.

Overall Shannon and her teammates had goals for their seasons, but they always approached games with the intensity and poise that was demanded of them in practice.

"We always had, like, the looming, 'We want to get to the national championship. We want to get to the NCAA tournament'...we prepared for every single game the same way, whether we were going into the round of 32 or it was our first game of the season, or if we had beat the team by 40 the year before, every practice the day before a game was run the same way. And I loved it, and I loved that standard and that expectation." Shannon said.

Shannon also advised that athletes should use their dedication and loyalty to their sport as a mindset to bring into everything they do.

"I would say, just buy into it. Yeah, everything you're doing, you're either gonna do it 100% or it's not going to turn out the way you want it to." Shannon said.

The skills Shannon learned to adapt to the busy schedule and navigate through college life were some more obvious benefits to her time at DePauw, but she still views them as important.

"The basic things, time, management, discipline, it's all things that you almost accept when you're in college that's really going to help you in the long run." Shannon said.

Shannon also remarked about the emphasis gained in Division III athletics, where balance becomes essential when faced with unique challenges.

"At the Division III level, you need to have time management. You need to know how to be able to stay on top of your studies when you're getting on a bus on a Wednesday morning and getting back at two o'clock in the morning on Thursday." Shannon said.

Following her time at DePauw, Shannon was a Graduate Assistant at Northern Illinois University for their women's basketball program, and has specific experiences from her time assisting the staff that she views as an example of the power of sports.

"Two years ago, my first year, when I was at NIU, it was National Girls and Women in Sports Day, and we were playing the number one ranked team in the conference… and we pulled it off when we beat a team that had two losses the entire year." Shannon said. "Seeing those 15 kids like light up and just love the day and love the moment, those big wins remind me what sports are about."

Her mindset and experience while playing at DePauw has influenced her now as she's had experience interacting with athletes in the situation she was in in her own career. Which helps her remind them about being aware of the stress that comes with competing.

"I say it to the NIU girls all the time, like, winning is fun, and you are there to win, and you are there to work hard, but you can never let how that went, or how the season's going and how you are playing, you can't let that affect how you treat your teammates. You can't let that affect how you treat other people. And that's really difficult for a lot of people." Shannon said.