Hall of Fame
Jennifer Scaffidi Grassel was an impact point guard for the SU women’s basketball team from 2001-05 who is among the all-time offensive leaders in multiple categories.
Her highly successful career with the Raiders includes two All-PSAC Western Division honors. As a senior, Grassel was named to the All-PSAC Western Division First Team and Daktronics, Inc. All-East Region Second Team after averaging a career-best 16.0 points per game and scoring 432 points. She also had single-season career bests with 60 three-pointers, shooting 39 percent from three-point range, and making 85.2 percent of her free throws (104-of-122) – a rate that was second-best in school history at the time.
Grassel was a four-year starter, four-time PSAC Scholar athlete and two-year captain. She is currently ranked eighth on the school’s career scoring lists with 1,583 points and 13.9 points per game. Her 79.4 percent career accuracy from the free-throw line over 510 attempts ranked second in school history at the time of her graduation and currently sits sixth all-time at SU.
Other notable statistics include 185 career steals, eighth-most in SU history, 188 three-pointers, fifth-most in SU history, and 405 made free throws, seventh-most in SU history. Only eight players in school history have made all of their free throws in a game with a minimum of 10 attempts, and Grassel is the only player in school history to do it twice – making 10-of-10 against Millersville and 12-of-12 against Edinboro as a freshman.
As the team’s point guard, Grassel is also the only player in SU history to record 100 or more assists in all four of her competitive seasons. She led the team in assists for four consecutive years and concluded her career with 481 assists, the third-most in SU history.
Grassel is the only player since current coach Kristy Trn during the 1992-93 season to lead the team in both scoring and assists, a feat she accomplished twice as both a sophomore and a senior. She played in all 114 of the team’s games during her four-year career, starting in 111 of them. During that time, the Raiders had a record of 69-45, a winning percentage of 60.5 percent.
In her junior year, SU lost to rival California, the eventual 2004 NCAA Champions, in the PSAC Championship game, but the Raiders handed the Vulcans their only loss of the whole year during the regular season in a game at Heiges Field House.
Grassel graduated in 2005 with a degree in mathematics and secondary education and in December 2011 she received her master’s degree in organizational development and leadership. She spent her first year out of college as an assistant coach at Shippensburg Area Senior High School.
A native of Washington Township, New Jersey, Grassel spent 2006-07 as the assistant varsity coach at her high school alma mater, while also working as a high school mathematics teacher. She was inducted into the Washington Township High School Sports Hall of Fame in 2008.
Grassel returned to Shippensburg in 2007 as the primary assistant to Kristy Trn and is set to enter her 10th season as an SU coach this fall. She has had a hand in 127 victories as an SU assistant coach and been a part of five Raider teams that have competed in the postseason.
Jen is married to her husband Mike ’06, and they are the proud parents of their daughter Kailie, who turns two in December. The couple is also expecting a new addition to the family in March.
