While her teammates ate first-class meals along the Riverwalk during last year’s Elite Eight in San Antonio, sophomore guard Taylor Woods had to search up and down for the best milkshakes in town.

After suffering a broken jaw in a February game against Michigan Tech, she had to have her mouth wired shut and could only eat and drink out of a straw. By the time she got unwired in April, she weighed just 108 pounds and had trouble even walking for long stretches.

“It was honestly one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do before in my life,” Woods said. “I just kept asking myself, ‘Why? Why me? Why did this happen?’”

Now the Eagles are back in San Antonio, and they could not have gotten here without the play of their young point guard. She has a lot more to look forward to than milkshakes this year.

“We’ve gone from milkshakes to shaking things up on the court,” head coach Sue Ramsey said.

During Ashland’s tournament run, Woods has been far from glass-jawed. In the three biggest games of her life, she played almost 39 minutes per game and averaged 13.7 points, 6.0 rebounds and 3.3 assists. She also drained 8 of 14 3-point field goal attempts (57.1 percent), with many of them coming at crucial times.

“Everything is just finally falling into place for me,” Woods said. “It’s just been a blast with this team.”

Of course, it was the play of another point guard that helped pull the Eagles within one cruel overtime period of a national championship just one year ago. Jena Stutzman is not forgotten, but Woods has done her best to fill the only hole on the team’s roster coming into this season.

It began with slowly readjusting to a normal diet until she was finally strong enough to go through offseason workouts with her dad, who coached her from the time she was five years old in AAU until she went to college. She finally played her first pick-up game during Ashland’s summer league in June.

“I was super scared my first game, but it was such a freak accident that I realized the likeliness of it happening again isn’t very high,” she said.

Woods came back strong and asserted herself in the starting lineup, but then had another setback in December when she suffered a concussion. After missing three games over Christmas break, she returned and was a huge factor (21 points) in a 76-66 midseason win over Michigan Tech.

Her shooting was constantly improving and with it so was her confidence. Then came the injury to National Player of the Year Kari Daugherty.

“That was kind of the turning point for me,” Woods said. “I just realized I needed to step up a little bit.”

In the eight games that Daugherty was out, Woods averaged 16.1 ppg and shot 52 percent from behind the arc. She has not cooled off since.

In the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference championship game against Findlay, she started a trend of hitting back-breaking 3-pointers late in the second half that continued into the first two games of the NCAA Midwest Regional tournament.

Her play on the defensive end was equally impressive. A big part of Woods’s growth has been the presence of junior guard Alyssa Miller as a role model and mentor. Miller is one of the team’s best defenders and challenged Woods from the day she joined the team.

“Last year, her coming in as a freshman was a big role for me because I enjoy being a leader and I knew it was my job when I left that she was gonna be the next leader on the whole entire team,” Miller said.

That leadership was tested in the regional semifinal against Michigan Tech when Miller had to sit down with three fouls in the second half. Forced to guard one of the region’s best and most experience guards in senior Sam Hoyt, Woods stepped up and contained her until Miller came back in.

“When she sat down I knew someone had to stop Hoyt, so I figured, like I said, I grew up a little bit today and I just knew I couldn’t let (Hoyt) be a factor,” Woods said in the press conference after the game.

Two nights later in the regional final against Wayne State, she went from growing up to putting on a show. In a physical first half when Daugherty had just three points, Woods came out and hit her first four 3-point attempts and finished with 17 points, six rebounds and four assists.

“She was one of the biggest successes of our team that night,” Miller said.

As the game wore on and the Eagles found themselves down, Woods was on the floor for the comeback. With 2:58 left, she made one of the plays of the tournament.

Ashland was up by one and Wayne State’s Talisha Bridges had the ball when Woods stepped in the gap to help Miller. As Bridges turned to shoot, Woods swiped the ball away and went racing down the court.

“She did the behind-the-back move, and she was like, ‘I don’t even know where that came from. I never do that,’” Miller said.

Woods was fouled and made both free throws to make it 64-61 and swing the momentum even more firmly in AU’s favor.

“That is the epitome of toughness,” Ramsey said. “Ripping that away from a very strong and very talented athlete, taking it the length of the floor and not being afraid of what’s in front of her.”

It is that last part that could be so crucial this week. Ashland’s slogan is “unfinished business.” To finish it with a championship, the Eagles will need the Woods that made All-Midwest Regional Tournament Team.

To this point, she has made pressure situations look easier than drinking a milkshake.