Cann Happy to Be Rid of Mask, Shooting Woes

In Hollywood, ordinary people can be turned into superheroes who wear masks. Iron Man, Captain America and Spiderman are just a few who fight the bad guys while donning a mask.

Unfortunately for Kentucky women’s basketball guard Makenzie Cann, her experience with a mask did not provide her with super powers. Instead, it had a much different effect.

Cann, a junior transfer who played her first year collegiately at Cincinnati, had her nose broken in Kentucky’s game at Duke on December 29 when a Blue Devils player inadvertently elbowed her in the face. The injury would not cost Cann time away from the court, but she would be forced to wear a protective mask to protect her nose.

“We played Duke Thursday, I went to the doctor Friday, practiced (with the mask) that day,” Cann said. “I guess I had one day in the mask before I played at Tennessee.”

The mask that Cann wore in the Tennessee game was far from ideal.

“It was not good, I really could not see out of it, honestly,” she said. “I told (the trainers) that, but my nose was dislocated and they didn’t know the severity of it yet, so I had to wear it.”

Cann gutted her way through 15 minutes in Kentucky’s loss at Tennessee on New Year’s Day. She missed all three of her shots from the field, but with good reason.

“I had no peripherals in that mask at all,” Cann said. “There was one point where I fell over nothing.”

Kentucky then returned home, and Cann was able to get a second mask. And while it still wasn’t perfect, it was an improvement.

 

“It was molded to my face,” Cann said of the second mask. “It was better, but it was not ideal. I could see a little better. It was more just irritating because every time someone would hit me, it would slide up and I’d have to pull it down.”

It was clear that the mask was affecting Cann’s shooting from the outside.

“She started out in conference 1 for 11, and she’s not a 1 for 11 three-point shooter,” Kentucky head coach Matthew Mitchell said.

In fact, in games without a mask this season, Cann has hit 30-of-82 (36.6 percent) of her three-point shots. With the mask, Cann hit just 1-of-9 (11.1 percent).

After going 0-of-3 against Texas A&M, Cann shed the mask, and it has seemed to make quite a difference. In Kentucky’s last two games, wins at Alabama and at home against Georgia, Cann has looked more like herself, hitting six-of-13 (46.2 percent) of her three-pointers.

“I feel like I was back to my normal self,” Cann said of life without the mask. 

But she also pointed out that it could have been a slump while she was wearing the mask. 

“At the beginning of the year, I was hitting shots, too,” Cann said. “Shooters go through good and bad times.”

Mitchell agreed.

“Sometimes, in the middle of the season, all of us can have these times,” Mitchell said of shooting slumps. “So maybe it was the mask, maybe she’s worked her way out of it.”

Cann is averaging 7.3 points and 3.9 rebounds per game this season. She has played in all 18 of Kentucky’s games, and is averaging 29.4 minutes per contest. Mitchell knows that Cann will be important for the Wildcats as the season moves forward.

“For us to be successful, to ultimately be the team we want to be, we’re asking her to shoot somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 percent from the three-point line,” Mitchell said of Cann. “She’s capable of doing that and when she does, it really lifts our team.”

Cann knows her shooting is important, but she also believes she has more to offer.

“My hustle and my will to win,” Cann said of other things she brings to the team. “I come from a high school where we won a lot. I have a winning attitude and I hope that’s something I can bring. Intangibles and hustle, things like that.”

That high school happens to be Anderson County High School in Lawrenceburg, Kentucky, meaning Cann is playing very close to home, which is something she appreciates.

“Definitely means a lot, I love being 20 minutes from home. I go home all the time. I grew up watching them play, so it means a whole lot.”

With or without the mask, Cann and the Wildcats hope that the shooting slump has run its course.