ANDY SAWYER/Yakima Herald-Republic Yakima Valley Community College's Andrea Blodgett handles the ball against Walla Walla Community College Wednesday, Jan. 10, 2007.

It just isn't done. Bigger has almost always been considered better.

And that's just what Cody Butler thought two years ago, when he went to a White Swan-Highland girls basketball game in search of players for his Yakima Valley women's team.

Then he saw Andrea Blodgett.

All 5-foot-4 inches and 100 pounds — give or take a few — of the Cougars' then-junior standout.

"The first thing I thought is that she fits," Butler said, referring to Blodgett's playing style, not her stature. "Every coach has a style they like, and my style is up-tempo. And if you like up-tempo, you like Andrea Blodgett."

Corey Baerlocher clearly did, back in 2005 when his Class 1A state-champion-to-be Colfax Bulldogs had survived a Blodgett-led White Swan assault, 35-32, in a first-round game in the SunDome.

In the same breath with which he lauded his own players, Baerlocher gushed about the Cougars' diminutive but dynamic junior point guard.

"We knew about her, and we tried to prepare for her," he said. "But she's as good a ballhandler as we've played against."

Still, even when Blodgett led White Swan to a 20-0 regular season as a senior, averaging 15 points a game while earning SCAC West Player of the Year honors for the second time, some thought it a stretch (pardon the pun) for Blodgett to play at the next level.

If Butler had doubts, they were allayed as soon as Blodgett competed favorably in open gyms with the likes of Laiken Dollente (ex-Eisenhower standout now at the University of Portland) and Elyse Mengarelli (ex-East Valley and YVCC star now at Central Washington).

"It was a concern," Butler said, emphasizing the past tense. "She is little, and we thought she might struggle against the bigger, faster, stronger girls. But she does a pretty good job of bouncing off people."

Probably because Blodgett does what she's been doing since she was big enough to bounce a ball — she just plays.

"I started coaching her when she was in second grade, when she couldn't even get the ball up to the hoop," her father, Joe Blodgett, said. "She was kind of a late bloomer, more a ballhandler and defensive specialist. But she learned the game so well.

"When she got into middle school, one of our best players got hurt and Andi pretty much took that team over."

She hasn't taken YVCC over, but hasn't needed to.

Sophomore 6-footers Chelsie Morrison and Whitney Honn have been solid, with Morrison posting team-high averages of 12.5 points and 4.7 rebounds. Tana Stickney, a 5-11 freshman from East Valley, has averaged 11.9 points and 4.6 boards while Blodgett has been the team's fourth double-digit scorer at 10.1 points.

Beyond her scoring, however, have been some contributions measurable statistically (23 offensive rebounds, third-best on the team, and 37 steals, second-best) and some not.

Many of Blodgett's team-leading 24 3-point field goals, for example, have come when the Yaks have most needed them.

Against Highline in the Chemeketa Holiday Classic, Blodgett counted two especially crucial 3-balls among her 22 points, using one to ignite a run which erased an early nine-point deficit and adding another that finished the Thunderbirds off.

She was named MVP of the tournament.

"Andi Jo has the ability," Butler said, "to take control of a game, and that's something every good team has to have. As a coach you always hope it's your point guard. It makes things a lot easier."

And of course there has been Blodgett's floor play, her uncanny ability to weave in and out of traffic while rarely losing control of either herself or the ball.

When Blodgett ventures inside the paint, where bigger and taller players typically loom, she seems always to have a purpose and her passes seem always to have a target.

Injuries? There has been one minor problem, a sore right arch that kept her out of two games.

"I've played against bigger girls my whole life," Blodgett said. "My size was a little bit of a problem at the beginning of the year, but I've adjusted."

She's also lifted weights, as the other Yaks have, and by most accounts has become not only stronger, but quicker and faster as well.

As Joe Blodgett credits his daughter with a keen knowledge of the game and a tireless work ethic, she commends him for teaching.

"He's been coaching me most of my life," Andrea said, "and I got to play for him my senior year in high school (when White Swan went 25-2 and finished seventh in the Class 1A state tournament), and that was a real fun experience.

"My dad has always emphasized the little things that help out a lot."

Other things, such as mental and physical toughness, Andrea seems to have developed on her own.

"When she was in seventh grade, we were playing in an AAU tournament and she broke her wrist," Joe Blodgett said. "She didn't tell me about it until after the tournament was over."

Joe Blodgett has no doubt told Andrea many things during their father-daughter/coach-player conversations, but he has never said she might be too small to play hoops at YVCC or any other college. Neither, obviously, has Butler.

"No one," she said, "has ever told me that."

It probably wouldn't have mattered if they had.

* Roger Underwood can be reached at 577-7694 or runderwood@yakimaherald.com