Montaya Dew waited a long time to put on the Arizona uniform. She waited a long time to run through the tunnel toward the roar of the McKale Center Crowd, warm up with her teammates and check into a game.
In Friday night’s UA women’s basketball exhibition against West Texas A&M, Dew was one of the first Wildcats off the bench, five minutes into the first quarter.
The 6-2 forward looked the part. She knew the plays, knew her assignments on each possession and made good decisions.
Dew, a redshirt freshman, arrived on the Arizona campus ahead of the spring semester of the 2022-23 season. As a grey shirt, she was able to enroll at the UA early, with plans to take the court the following season.
However, just as she was building for her first college season alongside the UA’s heralded freshman class of Jada Williams, Breya Cunningham and Skylar Jones, Dew tore her ACL in her left knee while boxing out in practice in August of 2023.
Arizona forward Montaya Dew works on her shooting touch during a summer practice in the Richard Jefferson Gymnasium on the UA campus on July 23. Dew missed her entire freshman year due to injury but is expected to play a big role for the Wildcats in 2024-25.
After surgery and recovery, the highest recruit in UA history (at No. 8) was cleared last spring for full contact drills with her teammates.
“She hasn’t played in over two years, so I think just the process of the game experience and learning, it takes time,” Arizona coach Adia Barnes said. “There’s no pressure. Just get her a rep, put her in different situations that I want to use her in. I think she did good.”
The Wildcats expect Dew to continue to get more comfortable on the court, and her next opportunity is Tuesday when they face Cal State LA in the final exhibition game at 6 p.m. at McKale Center. The game is streamed on ESPN+ with Steve Quis and Joan Bonvicini on the call and on 1400-AM with Derrick Palmer.
The things that Dew did well in her first game back are the things that Barnes takes notice of and tracks. They are the little things that make a difference.
Barnes has watched Dew grow over the last year-and-a-half — on and off the court; she’s watched Dew find her voice, her place and a purpose, while fully recovering and playing basketball with her teammates.
“I feel like there’s a lot that we can do, especially having every single piece together now,” Dew said of that four-deep UA sophomore class,” just things that McKale hasn’t seen yet, the fans haven’t seen.
Arizona forward Montaya Dew (12) strips the ball out of the hands of West Texas A&M guard Claire Graham (23) in the fourth quarter of the teams’ preseason exhibition matchup on Oct. 25 in McKale Center.
“There’s a lot in store with this group.”
Dew has always been smart. She can look at a play and just run it, without practicing. She’s versatile and can play all five positions on the court. During her recovery time last season, she watched even more film and games, to understand basketball more, including what she wants to do on the court.
“She’s special,” Barnes said. “She does the little things. If you watch when she’s off the ball and someone goes to drive on her she fakes and stops drives. It’s really good. She fakes, we call it stunting. That’s what we do (in the Arizona system). She does a lot of those little things on the court, makes the extra pass, doesn’t force shots, all those things.”
Dew had a lot of time to refine different parts of her game this past year. One specific area was shooting.
She was always shooting — during practice, with assistant coach Salvo Coppa, and on her own at night with the shooting gun.
“It was just practicing and practicing and practicing,” Dew said. “I feel like that’ll help us on the court, just having a bigger person on the outside, and having a bigger person guard us, so it will allow the guards to attack easier to the basket.”
Arizona forward Montaya Dew (12), left, and guard Jada Williams (2) celebrate a Wildcat 3 as the team puts away the Wildcats’ exhibition game against West Texas A&M on Friday in Tucson.
Dew, who was working on dunking before she came to Tucson, said she hasn’t tried doing it yet. However, she thinks if she jumped off her non-surgically repaired leg, she might get it. Stay tuned as it might be happening this season, “in one of these games, soon,” Dew said.
There are some things that Dew and Barnes know are still a work in progress. Barnes, who tore her ACL when she was playing professionally, has said it takes an athlete a full two years to get fully back.
Dew is still working on pushing off, as well as the mental side of knowing that her knee is strong and that she can do this.
And while Dew did a lot of exercises directly focused on building back her strength, some days her knee is still tight. This is when UA trainer Bart Jameson does the scraping technique to help circulation and reduce inflammation.
Throughout her recovery, Dew was touched by all the support not only from her family, but also her teammates and coaches.
“When you have those type of people around you, you forget that anything even happened to you,” Dew said, “because you are just so in the moment and just wanting to be there for your team, because you know they’re there for you.”
