Jana Van Gytenbeek's embrace of Baylor has helped her flourish

The gaggle of five-year-old boys couldn’t help but snicker when they first heard there was a girl on their youth league basketball team.

On the first day of practice, the coach lined everyone up and had them race from one baseline to the other and back again. 

The lone girl lapped the field.

The boys weren’t happy. They wanted another shot. 

The girl won again.

By that point, the coach put an end to the footraces and practice got started, as the boys — and one girl — ran some basic drills as they got to know each other at the start of the basketball season.

The boys were still preoccupied with the pre-practice races. So they lined up to race one more time.

And Jana Van Gytenbeek won. Again.

“That was a defining moment for the boys of saying, ‘I think she’s gonna be ok,’” Jana’s mom, Carol Van Gytenbeek, said. 

By the time the season ended, the same boys who were chortling at the fact that they were playing with a girl when the year started could not wait to have Jana back when the next season rolled around.

Even if they didn’t have much success.

“We lost every single game,” Jana said. “The next season we came back, it was all of us again, and we won one game. We were like, ‘We won double the amount of games we won last year!’ We were so happy about it, because we finally won.”

She’s been winning ever since.

The all-time assists leader in Colorado, she helped Cherry Creek High School win a state title as a junior in 2019, and advanced to the state title game again in 2020 before the COVID-19 pandemic ended her senior season early.

A five-star recruit and the Colorado Gatorade Player of the Year, she went to Stanford, where she spent two seasons and won back-to-back conference titles and a national championship in 2021. 

This season, her fourth at Baylor, has been her best. 

She’s started every game, leads the team in minutes played, and was named an All-Big 12 honorable mention. Her 194 assists for the Bears this season are the seventh-best single-season mark in program history.

“I am tired, but I’m happy to be tired,” Jana said.

But she probably has enough energy to beat the boys in a footrace if they dared to challenge her.

All in the family

Carol Van Gytenbeek could probably apply for permanent residence in the front row of section 112 at Foster Pavilion.

She’s been a constant presence this season, waving her flag and whooping and hollering.

Tony, Jana’s dad, is also at nearly every game, but chooses to sit on the opposite side of the arena from his wife, usually near the top, so he can watch the game in relative peace.

It doesn’t matter where her parents are sitting, Jana feels their presence.

“It means something I can’t put into words,” Jana said. “The one thing I've always wanted to do my whole life is make my parents proud, and when they're showing up to everything, and they're pouring into me, it's just a great feeling when things are going well or even not. 

“It keeps me going through life.” 

Her parents go wherever she goes, from Paris to Provo and everywhere in between. 

“I want to be there if I need to give Jana a smile or a thumbs up for any reason, just to let her know that it’s OK,” Carol said. “We’re going to be there to support her whether she plays two minutes or 40 minutes.”

Jana’s parents have spent plenty of time around sports. The whole family has, really.

Carol is in the Colorado Softball Hall of Fame, while Tony spent some time as a professional baseball player. 

Jana’s sister, Kyli, played softball at Yale, while her brother, Carter, played baseball at Army West Point. One uncle is a former BYU gymnast, while another ran track at Colorado State, and a third skied at Western State College. Her aunt played volleyball at San Jose State.

Her grandfather was a two-sport athlete at Princeton, playing football and baseball. 

Much to Carol’s chagrin, Jana thought softball was too boring. She decided to specialize in basketball over soccer just before high school.

“I think I didn't even realize that you had to choose to play sports,” Jana said. “I just always did. I never knew anything else. Anything I could do, I was doing it. Obviously, now I know why that was.”

When Jana decided she needed to leave Stanford, part of the reason she chose Baylor was that head coach Nicki Collen felt like family.

Jana played sparingly off the bench during her freshman season with the Cardinal when they won the national title. 

Collen played a similarly small role when she was a freshman at Purdue in 1993, averaging less than one point and one assist per game the year that the Boilermakers went to the Final Four for the first time. 

“There was something I saw in her that I identified with so much,” Collen said. “There’s a gratitude for what she has here and what this experience has meant for her. I’ve gotten to ride the highs and lows with her. She’s become one of mine.”

Collen didn’t sugarcoat things or guarantee playing time when Jana and her family came to Waco on their visit.

Over the last four years, Jana has developed a deep trust in Collen, and vice versa, in a way that only grows between family.

“She wants the best out of us, and she's going to be hard on us, but she's also going to comfort us,” Jana said. “I find a lot of safety and security being around her. I also know that she's going to push me to my limits, which is something that you want in a coach.”

The Comeback

Jana knew exactly what happened as soon as she hit the floor.

In the second half of the first game of last season, she went down with a non-contact injury to her left knee. A torn ACL.

Lying on the floor under the basket at Foster Pavilion, her first thoughts were about the seniors like Yaya Felder and Sarah Andrews, whom she wouldn’t get to play with again. 

Her next thoughts were about coming back.

“I didn't have doubts during rehab,” Jana said. “God took away all the fear that I thought I would have. He showed me so many different ways of life and love that didn't have to do with basketball or a knee injury. 

“I joke about it now, but I think sometimes that tearing my ACL was the best thing that ever happened to me.”

It was the first time in her athletic career that she was sidelined with a significant injury.

When she announced that she would be out for the season a few days later, she promised to be the best cheerleader and friend she could be. 

The year off gave her a fresh perspective.

“It just allowed me to see things with a little bit more space,” Jana said. “It's easy to think that you're right when you have all the game emotions in you, but when you can take a step back and see it for what it is… it helps you understand.”

She had surgery the day before Thanksgiving and was determined to be back within the nine-month timeline her doctors gave her.

When she finally got back on the court, the gigantic brace on her left leg was merely something to get used to.

“I never even thought about it,” Jana said.

But thoughts are different from what actually happens, and it did take her a few games to adjust.

Jana made just one of her eight shots in the season-opening, come-from-behind win over Duke in Paris and had four turnovers in a narrow road win over UNLV in the third game of the season.

“You can say you’re not going to let it hold you back, but until you’ve done that and repped it enough and had enough success, you’re just trying to talk yourself into it,” Collen said. “She wanted it so bad that she was gonna talk herself into believing she was where she wanted to be, because she worked so hard to get back and physically was in a good place. She’s done it better than most.”

Slowly but surely, she rounded into form. 

She had the eighth triple-double in Baylor history and dished out a career high 13 assists in December against Alabama State. She played 39 or more minutes in three of four games around the new year. 

She helped orchestrate a 19-point road comeback at Oklahoma State in the second game of Big 12 play and then matched a career high with 19 points in a win at Cincinnati in February.

This is the first season since high school that Jana has been a full-time starter.

She played less than 10 minutes per game off the bench during her two seasons at Stanford. Even in her two full seasons at Baylor prior to her injury, she came off the bench and played less than 15 minutes per game.

“It’s been great to see her come back nine months later and prove that she’s ready for the court and that she belongs on the court,” Carol said.

Jana’s Baylor career is not over.

The Bears begin the Big 12 Tournament this week in Kansas City and will be in the NCAA Tournament in a few weeks.

But when it is over, the native Coloradan who spent time in California is happy to stay on the banks of the Brazos.

“I would say I found myself here, and it's my home,” Jana said. “I am so grateful for all of the experiences I had here, for all the people I met, for the foundation for my faith. I've completely fallen in love with Waco and Baylor, and I want to repay it however I can for the rest of my life.”