Oshauna Holland’s relentless style serves her and Stuart Cramer in two sports
Stuart Cramer sophomore guard Oshauna Holland’s relentless style of play has been so impressive that a rival coach once asked Storm head coach Carey Pohlman what she was eating that kept her so active.
“She’s just a tremendous player and hard worker,” Pohlman said of Holland, who led Stuart Cramer to its first winning season since 2017 and to its first conference championship in its nine-year school history a year ago. “She does a lot of things well and she’s just as active defensively as she is offensively.”
Holland also is more than just a basketball star as her recent success in the Big South 3A Conference cross-country championships would indicate; Holland was the 2023 individual champion and her winning time of 22 minutes, 1.83 seconds was nearly 37 seconds ahead of the second-place finisher.
“This is my second year running,” Holland said of cross-country. “Last year I did pretty good. This year, I’ve had a little bit more success. I was using it just to get ready for the (basketball) season. It was kind of a side thing.”
As a freshman a year ago, Holland averaged 18.1 points, 5.9 rebounds, 5.5 steals and 0.8 blocks as the Storm finished 22-6 overall and 11-3 in the Big South 3A Conference before winning the postseason tournament.
The overall wins and conference wins were school records in a season in which Stuart Cramer made the state playoffs for the first time since 2017.
“It was really nice for our team to be the first to do a lot of stuff at the school,” Holland said. “We just bonded and had a connection as a team that boosted us.”
Holland’s efforts have drawn interest from several major colleges as she visited N.C. State, Duke, Queens, Davidson and Wake Forest and drew interest from Fordham during the offseason.
With 507 points last season, Holland could become the fourth 1,000-point career scorer in the school’s girls basketball history this season. Previously, Carley Womack (Class of 2019 with 1,300 points), Jordan Bryant (Class of 2016 with 1,115 points) and Haley Bourhill (Class of 2018 with 1,015 points) have reached that milestone.
Holland considers that one of her goals.
“I definitely want to get my 1,000-point ball, go farther in the playoffs and hopefully win the Christmas tournament again,” Holland said. “I want to get better and get my team better. We have a young team and I want to help us be together as a team and be a leader.”
