![\"Basketball](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/TOP-L-BealOU-032726-02.jpg\")
West Bloomfield’s Sheridan Beal (10) shoots a fadeaway jumper in a game against Stoney Creek on Thursday, Jan. 29, 2026 in Rochester Hills. (BRYAN EVERSON – MediaNews Group)<\/p>\nThe coaching carousel helped land Oakland University women\u2019s basketball a great local product late in the recruiting process.<\/p>\n
Originally committed to North Alabama before a move by its head coach, West Bloomfield senior Sheridan Beal announced her commitment to the Golden Grizzlies on Thursday night.<\/p>\n
\u201cI loved their playing style, I think that\u2019s something I\u2019m really used to with their offense,\u201d Beal said in a phone interview Friday evening. \u201cI like the coaching staff, they have great energy, and I think they have a coaching style that\u2019ll work really well with me. The resources at the school are great, I like the girls and the environment the coaches have built. I like the school in general, the campus, the academics, too. And it\u2019s close to home. There\u2019s a lot of pluses and it made it an easy decision.\u201d<\/p>\n
On March 11, North Alabama announced that head women\u2019s basketball coach Candi Whitaker would be departing for the vacancy at Kansas City. The day after, Beal reopened her recruiting process.\n<\/p>\n
Beal indicated that the Whitaker kept an offer to her on the table with the Roos, and reiterated her appreciation for that staff, but she felt going with Oakland and head coach Keisha Newell was the best move for her.<\/p>\n
Newell\u2019s Class of 2026 includes Muskegon\u2019s Cece Bonner, but Kyra Lawrence (Farmington Hills) was the only Michigan native on this year\u2019s Oakland U roster.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen the opportunity came up with Oakland, I told her its great,\u201d West Bloomfield head coach Darren McAllister said. \u201cI told her it fits her style of play, and (for us) it\u2019s a great opportunity to get a good connection with the coaching staff, and hopefully we get some more players from West Bloomfield over there.\u201d<\/p>\n
In her final year as a Laker, Beal, a McDonald\u2019s All-American nominee, averaged 22.5 points \u2014 including the 1,000th of her career \u2014 3.7 rebounds and 1.9 steals.<\/p>\n
Adversity depleted West Bloomfield\u2019s inside threats and dictated that Beal had to run the floor more, whereas she\u2019d been used primarily as an off-guard throughout her career.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe was facing a lot of double teams, face-guarding, and she wasn\u2019t accustomed to that with Summer and Indya (Davis) and Kendall (Hendrix), all those guys,\u201d McAllister said. \u201cIt made her better, taught her how to utilize screens and move without the ball, and I think she got better at that.\u201d<\/p>\n
That and taking her place as the figurehead of the Lakers were things that McAllister and West Bloomfield\u2019s staff worked with her on to make her a better player for the next level.<\/p>\n
West Bloomfield’s Sheridan Beal (10) shoots a fadeaway jumper in a game against Stoney Creek on Thursday, Jan. 29, 2026 in Rochester Hills. (BRYAN EVERSON – MediaNews Group)<\/p>\n
\u201cShe was known as a shooter, and (Sheridan) can shoot with the best, but I told her we need to take your game to the next level by getting to the basket and using her pull-up jumper,\u201d McAllister said. \u201cHer pull-up was deadly. When I see it, I think of Summer, without a doubt. She\u2019s a strong kid, and that\u2019s what we were trying to elevate. She didn\u2019t disappoint (in becoming more than a 3-point shooter).<\/p>\n
\u201cThe other thing was just (working on) being a leader. She\u2019s not a vocal kid, but I said, \u2018You\u2019ve got to be more vocal, talk to your teammates and make them better.\u2019 She didn\u2019t disappoint there either.\u201d<\/p>\n
When asked if she improved more with her on-court or mental skills more over her senior year, Beal felt it was all the above. \u201cThis is the first time I\u2019ve been the oldest, head of the team, so my role definitely changed with that and I saw what it was like to have to lead a team. And my game, too, I think that definitely changed in my game with getting to the rack more, playing point guard, setting people up more.\u201d<\/p>\n
A reserve on the Lakers\u2019 state runner-up team when she was a freshman, Beal stepped into the starting lineup for the Lakers\u2019 D1 championship in 2024. As a junior, she became a focal point and helped carry the team to an 19-9 record, reaching the state semifinal. She averaged 16.1 points and was recognized with a first-team nod on the Michigan Sports Writers Division 1 All-State girls basketball team.<\/p>\n
This season, Beal kept up her reputation as an elite 3-point shooter. After averaging 37% from the perimeter last season, she shot 38% (65 of 172) from deep as a senior, and knocked down 48-of-59 free-throw attempts.<\/p>\n
With all that, Beal certainly left her mark at West Bloomfield despite not winning a district title in her swan song.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe\u2019s already on our Wall Of Fame, she was there last year,\u201d McAllister said. \u201cThe thing with Sheridan is, she had an opportunity to learn from some of the better players who\u2019ve walked the halls of West Bloomfield, to see how they put in the work. And they taught her how to do it the West Bloomfield way. She did it and became one of the best to walk the hallways as well, without a doubt, She\u2019ll be missed. This year, she was the coach on the floor.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI had an amazing experience accomplished so many things,\u201d Beal said of her career as a Laker. \u201cI\u2019ve grown so much as a person and player. It didn\u2019t end how I\u2019d have liked it to, but I think i did some good things personally. I got my 1000th point, was nominated for McDonald\u2019s All-American. So many great things came out of it. I\u2019m happy and have a lot of gratitude for my experience.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The coaching carousel helped land Oakland University women\u2019s basketball a great local product late in the recruiting process.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":240325,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[2044,795,143,904,145,144,127,7910],"class_list":{"0":"post-240324","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-oakland","8":"tag-high-school-sports","9":"tag-michigan","10":"tag-oakland","11":"tag-oakland-county","12":"tag-oakland-headlines","13":"tag-oakland-news","14":"tag-sports","15":"tag-west-bloomfield"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240324","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=240324"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240324\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/240325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=240324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=240324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=240324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}