Maize freshman’s 39-point game announces new star in Wichita girls basketball
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- Maize freshman Heidi Williams scored 39 points to lift team to 59-56 overtime win.
- Performance announced Williams as emerging star in Wichita girls high school basketball.
- Coach Shelby Hillman reacted with surprise and recognition after game.
After the noise settled from an electric, come-from-behind overtime victory, Maize girls basketball coach Shelby Hillman flipped open the scorebook and let out an audible gasp.
Thirty-nine points.
From a freshman.
Heidi Williams’ breakout game earlier this month wasn’t just a career performance, it was the kind of game that announces a new star in the Wichita high school basketball scene. The 5-foot-10 ninth-grader poured in 39 points to carry Maize to a 59-56 overtime win over Valley Center on Jan. 16.
“At the end of the game, I knew she had a ton of points,” Hillman said. “But then I opened up the book and it said 39 and I was like, ‘Whoa, she really did that.’”
Williams didn’t realize the number, either.
“It did surprise me a little bit when I found out it was 39,” she said. “I didn’t even believe it after the game. But it feels good. It shows myself what I’m capable of.”
For a Maize team still trying to find its footing at 4-7, the performance offered a glimpse of what the Eagles can become with Williams healthy. She missed an extended time earlier this season after suffering an ankle injury in the second game, and the difference in Maize has been noticeable since her return.
In a 44-38 loss to Salina South, a top-10 team in Class 5A, Williams scored 25 points. Three days later came the eruption against Valley Center, giving her 64 points in two games in the same week.
In eight of Maize’s 11 games this season, the Eagles didn’t score as many total points as Williams did by herself that night.
Williams set the tone early in the Valley Center game by relentlessly attacking the rim. Then the 3s started falling, propelling Maize back in a game that it spent the majority of the time trailing.
Maize trailed 52-45 with three minutes left in regulation when Williams took over. The freshman split a double team and banked in a runner in the lane. She knocked down a pair of free throws, then found Kate Harris for a key bucket. And with 22.7 seconds left, Williams calmly sank two more free throws to tie the game and force overtime.
In the extra period, she drilled a deep, high-arching 3 to give Maize its first lead at 56-54, then sprinted back and swatted away what looked like a sure Valley Center basket at the rim.
“It was honestly amazing,” Williams said. “It was a close game the whole time and it went to overtime, so the tension was just like crazy. I was just in a zone. I honestly kind of blacked out. It was like a blur.”
Williams actually fouled out with 1:53 left in overtime with Maize clinging to a one-point lead. That’s when her teammates finished the job. Abigail Sabbagh split a pair of free throws for the lead, then Kennedy Anderson lofted a perfect over-the-top pass to Harris for a basket that sealed the win.
It was the most points in a game Williams had ever scored in any setting, whether it be AAU or high school.
“I was just ready to be back,” she said of returning from her injury. “Over the break, I’d been training a lot and been in the gym. So I was ready to come out and show everyone what I could do.”
Williams’ family moved back to the Wichita area from Colorado this past summer and while she only played a handful of summer-league games with Maize, Hillman noticed her touch and basketball IQ immediately. The full picture came into focus in the fall when Hillman coached Maize’s inaugural girls flag football team.
That’s when the coach pegged Williams as a future standout.
“Right away, her athleticism stuck out and her hands and her footwork,” Hillman said. “We weren’t playing basketball, but I could already tell she was going to be a standout.”
At 5-foot-10, Williams has the size of a forward but the skill-set of a guard. She’s most comfortable on the perimeter, where she can use her ball-handling ability and quickness to attack downhill and finish around the rim.
Now she’s learning what comes next after a headline performance.
Andover Central made sure of that, throwing tougher coverage her way in a 48-28 loss that followed the scoring binge. After nine days off, Williams is eager to show she absorbed those lessons when Maize opens the Wildcat Classic in Haven on Thursday against Cheney.
She may have introduced herself to the Wichita basketball scene with her scoring ability, but she wants to continue to make her mark by becoming a well-rounded player.
“I still need to focus on the little things,” she said. “I know scoring seems like a big deal, but it’s really about the little things.”
This story was originally published January 28, 2026 at 6:01 AM.
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