Britt Prince follows mother’s guidance to state titles, national stardom
ELKHORN, Neb. (BVM) — Elkhorn North sophomore sensation Britt Prince is ranked by ESPN as the No. 10 high school girls basketball recruit in the country for the Class of 2024. She already holds 22 Division I offers and she’s even drawn comparisons to UConn sophomore star Paige Bueckers.
But as her mother – and Elkhorn North’s head coach – Ann Prince fondly recalls, Britt has been attracting attention with her performance on the court since her early elementary school years.
“We were playing in this OSA (Omaha Sports Academy) first/second grade co-ed league and we had four girls on our team, went undefeated in the top division, and it was all boys teams that we were playing (against),” Ann recalled. “I remember there were some people talking at that time and they’re like, ‘Hey, I’m going to make a phone call to (then-Nebraska head coach) Connie Yori. This Britt Prince is good.’”
There’s no question that statement holds true today for Britt, who’s become one of the most highly sought after recruits in the country, with even the likes of perennial powerhouse UConn showing interest in the four-star point guard who’s already surpassed 1,000 career points in two seasons of high school basketball. Britt has also led Elkhorn North to back-to-back state championships in the first two years of the school’s existence.
“It’s really crazy,” Britt said. “Last year for sure it definitely felt like a dream. Ever since I was young I’ve been watching the state basketball championships on TV or going there to watch and it’s something I’ve always dreamed of. I’ve been wanting to play in the championship games ever since I was young and to actually be in it two years in a row and win it is just crazy.”
Britt has been able to share the entire experience with her mom, a former player herself. Ann has doubled as her daughter’s coach and paved the way for her success since Britt began playing basketball at the age of 4. After playing four years (1987-91) of college basketball for Midland University, an NAIA school in Fremont, Nebraska, Ann became an assistant coach at her alma mater for 16 years before taking another assistant coaching job at Fremont High School where she also worked as a PE teacher.
“She was a really big influence,” Britt said of her mom. “I was always wanting to go to her practices when she was a coach. Even when she was at Midland and I was really young, I would go and shoot while they were practicing. And also at Fremont when I got a little bit older I would love going to practices and just shooting while they’re practicing. I just always loved being in the gym and especially with her too.”
It was always one of Ann’s goals to become a head coach somewhere, and she jumped at the opportunity to apply for the position at the newly-built Elkhorn North High School, which just so happened to coincide with the start of her daughter’s prep career.
“It was pretty cool,” Britt said. “My mom’s pretty much been my coach my whole life. Really the only time she wasn’t my coach was for middle school ball like seventh or eighth grade. I was excited when I found out (she was the coach).”
While the mother-daughter duo has already made history with two state titles in Elkhorn North’s first two years, there is still plenty of potential to make more. Four state titles in four years will be no easy task, but it’s well within the realm of possibility.
“I’ve obviously thought about it before and how that’d be awesome,” Britt said. “But I’m really just focusing on getting better each game, each practice and each season and kind of taking it day by day. It’ll come if it comes.”
Regardless of what Britt is able to accomplish with the Wolves over the next two years, attention will undoubtedly continue to come for the star point guard who seems to be on every college program’s recruiting radar.
“It kind of happened fast,” Britt said of the attention she’s getting from college coaches. “But I’ve been blessed to be able to be recruited by all these amazing colleges and coaches and it’s been a really awesome experience getting to know everyone throughout the process. Overall it’s been really good.”
Britt has visited six of the colleges she’s received offers from so far – Creighton, Nebraska, Iowa, Iowa State, Oklahoma and Indiana – and she plans to visit a lot more this spring and summer. And as she continues to work through the recruiting process, she’ll have her mother’s guidance to lean on, just as she has all along the way to becoming one of the nation’s top recruits.
“There’s so many programs here that you’d be silly not to at least go look at those places and kind of see where you think you fit in,” Ann said. “And then you have some decisions to make as far as the program, and closeness to home and seeing if they see her playing right away or not playing right away. There’s a lot of things that play into it – the winning piece, the coach, is the coaching going to be around? I think there’s just so many things that go into the decision and it’s something you don’t take lightly at all.”
Wherever Britt eventually decides to take her immense talent, she’ll be bringing the kind of well-rounded game that all coaches dream of having in their program. Whether it’s with her innate ability to take over the game as a scorer or be the primary ball handler who can distribute with the best of them, she’ll be a valuable asset to any college basketball team in a couple more years.
“Her versatility is huge and that’s what many of the coaches who’ve seen her play have said is that they love her versatility,” Ann said. “She’s not the very best at one particular thing, but she does everything at a pretty high hevel and she can fill a variety of roles… She makes the right reads, she makes the right plays, she’s not a selfish player, and those are the things I’m hearing from coaches that they like about her and maybe what separates her from other players out there.”