Celebrating the 40th Anniversary of Title IX, wmubroncos.com takes a look at 40 key moments/females in the history of women's athletics at Western Michigan University. Though the selection process, an effort was made to highlight a moment and player/coach from each of our current women's sports programs, as well pay respect to our women's legacy sports. A different feature will be released each of the 40 days, July 24 through Sept. 1.

Kina Brown
Women's Basketball: 1991-95
WMU Athletic Hall of Fame: 2010

Kina Brown came to Western Michigan as a highly recruited power forward out of Chicago, Ill., and lived up to the hype, as she took the Mid-American Conference by storm, averaging 19.4 points per game her first season to earn MAC Freshman of the Year honors.

During her four years in a Bronco uniform, Brown rewrote the Western Michigan record book, setting school records for career points (1,814) and free throws made (541), while ranking second in career rebounds (911) and field goals made (620), and third in blocked shots (83).

When asked about her game, Brown stated, "I just started playing with the neighborhood boys when I was young. I just kept going and I didn't stop. Using my strength and my quickness was part of that. I took pride in my rebounding."

Today, Brown still shares the career free-throw record, and is third in career scoring and second in rebounding. Her career scoring record stood over 10 years, until Casey Rost broke it in 2006, and Carrie Moore later passed Brown & Rost in 2007. Brown remains in the top-10 all-time for field goals made and blocked shots.

For her career, she averaged 16.5 points and 8.3 rebounds per game. One of the most notable games of Brown's career came in a 36-point effort against Boston College, which is the fifth highest single-game total in school history.

Brown is the only Bronco ever to earn All-MAC status all four years, picking up Second Team honors her first season to go along with her Freshman of the Year title. She collected First Team All-MAC honors in each of her final three seasons.

Brown is also the only Bronco in school history to be named to the U.S. National Junior Team, which she competed on in both 1992 and 1993, playing internationally in Canada and Taiwan.

Upon completion of her career at Western Michigan, Brown played professionally in Hungary and Portugal before coming back to the states to play five seasons in the National Women's Basketball League. Suiting up with the Chicago Blaze and Dallas Fury, she played alongside such names as Tamika Catchings and Sheryl Swoopes.

After Brown retired from the game of basketball, she went on to complete three masters' degrees in criminal justice, business and health & physical education.

"Western Michigan University was a big part of my success as far as what I've done academically," said Brown, in a 2010 interview with the Kalamazoo Gazette.

"They were very clear that you're an athlete second and you're a student first. Jeff Stone and Kathy Beauregard, it was a long time ago, but they really instilled that in us. They built the foundation of academics and taking care of business in the classroom because basketball is a privilege. It still is."

Brown was inducted into the WMU Athletic Hall of Fame in 2010.