Former Lady Topper great Kendall Noble has inked her first professional contract with the Chemnitz ChemCats of the German Damen Basketball Bundesliga (DBBL) for the upcoming season in the fall as announced by the team on Wednesday afternoon.
Noble will join former teammate Alexis Govan as Lady Toppers in action in European leagues. Govan was a starter during the 2016-17 campaign for Boa Viagem in Portugal and recorded a triple-double in league play during the season. Noble and Govan were teammates at WKU from 2012-13 to 2014-15 and captured two conference tournament championships during their time together.
The city of Chemnitz is located about three hours south of the German capital of Berlin and two hours west of Prague, Czech Republic. The ChemCats are currently coached by Amanda Davidson and feature a pair of American players in Merritt Hempe (formerly at Georgia) and Valerie McQuade (a former player at Niagara).
Noble completed her WKU career in style with a sweep of the C-USA regular season and tournament championships to end the 2016-17 season. The Hazard, Ky., native was the only Division I player in the nation to average 16 points, six rebounds, five assists and 2.5 steals per game this season and became just the fifth player in program history to earn All-Conference honors four times, joining Lady Topper legends Clemette Haskins, Lillie Mason, Kami Thomas and Crystal Kelly.
Known for her versatility on the court, Noble remains the only player in WKU’s storied women’s basketball history to record a triple-double, notching two as a junior against Charlotte and Marshall. The latter also stands as the only triple-double in the history of the C-USA Tournament, and Noble was the only player in the nation to record multiple triple-doubles during the 2015-16 campaign. As a junior, Noble also captured the C-USA Player and Defensive Player of the Year awards, becoming only the fourth player in conference history to win both awards in the same season.
Noble stands as the only Lady Topper Basketball player who currently ranks in the top 10 in WKU’s record book in all five major statistical categories. The newly-minted professional finished her career with 1,888 points (fifth), 881 rebounds (eighth), 613 assists (second) and 84 blocks (10th) and became WKU’s all-time record holder with 358 steals. Noble also holds the WKU career record for minutes played (4,474) and ranks third in games played (135) and fourth in games started (123).
In addition to her prowess on the court, Noble became just the third Academic All-American in Lady Topper Basketball history and the first selection in 35 years as she earned Third Team honors in 2015-16. Noble was also a 2016-17 candidate for the Senior CLASS Award recognizing a player’s talents on the court, in the classroom and in the community at large.
The DBBL season begins in late September and is the top division of women’s professional basketball in Germany. This season, the ChemCats finished eighth in the standings and reached the quarterfinals of the league’s playoffs, falling in the best-of-three series to eventual league champions Wasserburg.
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Currie P. McFayden
WKU Associate Director of Media Relations