Annie Roshak, 42, fires a pass into the post to her teammate, Hayley Smith, for an assist during a matchup against Grand Valley State on March 13, 2023.
ASHLAND — For Ashland University’s standout basketball player Annie Roshak, it all started on the cul-de-sac’s hoop.
“I would just sit and watch my older brothers play,” Roshak said after a recent practice at Kates gym.
She had nine siblings growing up.
“They would have friends over and I would just sit in the grass and watch them play and kinda long for the day I would play with them.”
It was in those early years where Roshak not only became a keen observer of the game, but a lover of the game. That passion has propelled the senior to success on the Ashland University’s women’s basketball team as its leading scorer with an average of 15.3 points scored per game.
That’s not all, though. She’s the best free-throw shooter the university has ever seen with a remarkable 93.5% from the line. Sara Loomis previously held that record of 90.1% that she set in the 2018-19 season.
With a 64% field goal percentage, she was also the 12th leading scorer in AU’s program history going into the 2022-23 season with 1,336 points. Roshak currently ranks as the school’s fifth all-time scorer with 1,800 points.
In addition, she's eighth in all-time field goal percentage with a high 58.6% in the 2020-21 season and 10th all-time in field goals made in the 2021-22 season.
Clearly, Roshak — a 6-foot-1 forward — can score.
“She’s a dynamic scorer — her ability to finish (at the net) is like no other,” said former teammate Karlee Pireu.
Yet, Roshak’s dominance on the court stands out in other ways. She can pass. She started her career with 19 assists and now has 69 this season. She’s hungry for the ball, too, snatching 178 rebounds this season, compared to 109 as a freshman -- she also collected 50 steals last season.
Annie Roshak, 42, fires a pass into the post to her teammate, Hayley Smith, for an assist during a matchup against Grand Valley State on March 13, 2023.
“From the beginning, she’s just been a competitor,” said Abbey Allerding, her coach at North Canton Hoover High School, where Roshak developed as the school’s third-leading scorer with 1,436 points.
Roshak also became Hoover’s fifth all-time rebounder and shot 80% from the free-throw line. She earned second-team All-Ohio as a senior and first-team All-Northeast Inland district and first-team All-Federal League twice.
“She has that competitive nature. She has a drive. If you watch her, you see that in her face and how she plays — she plays with heart,” Allerding said.
Where did it all start?
Tim Roshak, her father, said he never expected Annie to excel in basketball as much as she has.
“She was just my child, you know? I always thought she was good … for me, I knew she was my daughter and that I enjoyed watching her play,” he said.
Tim Roshak said he suspects Annie’s competitive nature came from being around siblings who really excelled academically. Two of her brothers finished school as valedictorians and another was a salutatorian.
“Others were on the edge as well,” Tim Roshak said of his children.
He remembered an anecdote he heard from one of Annie’s teachers.
“One day, Annie apparently told her teacher about her brothers being valedictorians. And she told her teacher, ‘I wanna do that, too.’ It didn’t end up happening for her, but she was still pretty close,” her dad said.
As an accounting major at AU, Roshak posted a 3.83 GPA in the fall semester of 2022, earning her a Division II Academic All-America second-team laurels. She was honored as third-team Academic All-America in 2022.
It’s a distinction Roshak wears with pride.
“Being a student comes first,” she said, adding that she came to AU to play basketball but “also to get a degree.” Roshak, who is slated for graduation in May, is excited to start an internship with the J.M. Smucker Company in its finance department that will extend through the summer.
Her desire to excel in the classroom evidently primed a work ethic that coaches only hope all their players have, said Allerding, her high school coach. Allerding first witnessed Roshak’s skill for the sport at a youth league when the Annie was in sixth grade.
“(Allerding) took an interest in her,” Tim Roshak said. “I remember asking her later, ‘how did you know?’ And she just told me, ‘Well, we can just tell.’ ”
At some point during young Roshak’s early days, her parents invested in their daughter’s talent by installing a 30 x 30-foot cement pad with in their backyard. No more wobbly cul-de-sac hoop.
“And she was out there all the time,” her dad remembers.
Strong player; strong faith
Allerding said she and Roshak share a faith in God that led to a bond.
“Becoming a mentor is a goal that I have with all of my players. But I definitely think there is something special with Annie that we have. And so how did we develop that relationship? I think it was through the Lord,” Allerding said.
She said Roshak’s spirituality is a big part of what makes her a strong basketball player.
“You can’t always see that on the court. But, off the court, she’s a faithful young woman trying to positively influence her teammates, and it’s evident she plays for the glory of God,” her high school coach said.
Roshak said it’s her faith that has made her not just a consistently good player, but a leader as one of the team’s veterans. She acknowledged all her improved stats — both offensively and defensively — but that she’s proud of the fact she’s grown into a “calm and collected” player on the court.
“I have some more in-game experience, some more big-game experience. And so being able to be calm and collected and kind of lead the way for those younger (players) in that as well,” Roshak said.
Roshak’s “calm and collected” way on and off the court has blossomed into a friendship between her and Pireu. The friendship started as a bit of a rivalry, actually. The two played against each other in high school, and then guarded each other for a time at AU.
Pireu, two years older than Roshak, remembers playing some “competitive games” against her friend.
“She’s really talented. There’s this presence to her out on the floor. She’s just really fun to play against, honestly,” Pireu said.
The friendly rivalry evolved into a friendship, as both share a strong faith.
“She’s one of my best friends still. Our interactions, on and off the court, have been so special to me,” she said.
‘Pressure is a privilege’
The women’s basketball team last won a national championship in 2017. The squad then finished as runner-up champions in 2018, one year before Roshak joined. In 2020, when Roshak played off the bench as a freshman, the team went into the regionals undefeated.
It was just before regionals started in Drury, Mo., in March 2020. After a practice, the team found out the NCAA had canceled the tournament due to COVID, dashing hopes for another chance at the title.
Roshak said her team is hungry for a national championship win. She feels the pressure, but she said she tries not to think about that.
The Ashland University women's basketball team poses with the regional championship banner after Monday night's win over Grand Valley State.
“Pressure is a privilege. We’ve put in the work to be in this situation. And what a privilege that is to get to play on the big stage against some really good teams.”
