For many players, scoring 20 or more points in a game is a career highlight, but Katie Montague made the feat look easy, producing 30 such games during her outstanding run with Wooster’s women’s basketball team en route to 1,610 career points, the most in the program’s 48-year history.
Montague was heavily recruited by both John Carroll University and Mt. Union College, but Wooster ultimately won out, and the women’s basketball team began reaping the rewards right away. In her collegiate debut, the 5-11 forward scored a game-high 16 points, and by the midway point of her freshman season, she had emerged as the team’s top offensive weapon. Montague averaged 13.0 points, including a league-best 78.2 free throw percentage, and 5.0 rebounds on her way to North Coast Athletic Conference Newcomer-of-the-Year and second-team all-NCAC honors. The Scots also advanced to the finals of the NCAC Tournament that season, which remains the last time the program reached the tourney’s championship game.
As a sophomore, Montague ranked third in the league in scoring (15.8 ppg) and increased her rebounding total a bit (5.7 rpg) to earn a spot on the All-NCAC First Team. However, it was her junior season that was not only the best of her career, but one of the greatest ever by a player donning the Black and Gold.
"In my junior year, I switched positions from power forward to small forward, so I had the ball in scoring positions a lot more,” recalled Montague. “My teammates put me in situations where I could score, and I was able to deliver. Plus, I think I had a knack for getting my shot off even when I was tightly guarded.”
Montague kicked off the 1997-98 season by reaching the 20-point mark in nine of the team’s first 11 games, highlighted by a 38-point explosion against Kenyon College – the most points in a single game in team history. She also went 15-for-15 from the free throw line that night, which remains an NCAC record.
At year’s end, Montague had surpassed several of the program’s single-season marks, including points (21.5 ppg) and free throws made (128). Most impressive, she became the first, and remains the only, Wooster women’s basketball player to garner a spot on the D3hoops.com All-America Team (honorable mention) and to be selected the NCAC Player of the Year. In the process, she took over as the program’s all-time leading scorer with 1,283 points, yet she still had her senior season to go.
“The most memorable moment for me was breaking the all-time scoring record,” added Montague. “My immediate family and extended family, and all my close Wooster friends and teachers were there to support me.”
Montague may not have matched her previous season’s statistical explosion as a senior, but she still paced the Scots with 13.6 points per game and was named all-conference once again (honorable mention), becoming one of only two players in team history to be a four-time all-NCAC selection.
After Montage graduated Wooster, the communication sciences and disorders major then earned a master’s degree in speech therapy from the University of Akron, and is now a nationally-recognized speech-language pathologist. Montague spends most of her time working with children who are deaf or hard of hearing, and is one of just 10 licensed Auditory-Verbal Therapists in the state of Ohio.
Personally, she married fellow 1999 Wooster alum Sean Malone and they live in Shaker Hts., Ohio, with their two children, Quinn (4) and Ronan (2).