Double Trouble

Theresa Kelly, a writer for Georgia Bulldog Magazine at the University of Georgia, was very specific when she asked assistant sports information director Tim Hix to summon one of the Lady Bulldog stars from the Georgia locker room for an interview after a recent game against Arkansas. "Make sure it's Ca-mille," she said. Shortly thereafter, senior forward Camille Lowe's identical twin sister, Miriam, a reserve, emerged and sat down across from Kelly, who asked her, "How do I know for sure that you're Camille?"

"Miriam has a lower voice," said Miriam, truthfully.

Thus reassured, Kelly asked Lowe questions for 10 minutes. But before Miriam had the chance to deliver her big line—"Lowe everything to Miriam"—Hix's conscience got the better of him and he told Kelly she was the victim of a prank.

Opportunities for this kind of treachery are everywhere in Division I women's basketball these days. Would you trust yourself—or anyone else—to tell the difference between sophomore identical twin blurs Falisha and LaKeysha Wright of San Diego State when they're driving down the court in matching red-white-and-black uniforms? Quick, which Kuziemski of North Carolina State just made that three-pointer: Jenny or Krissy? It's hard to tell, isn't it, especially when their numbers, 41 and 14, respectively, are so maddeningly mirrorish.

Virginia seniors Heather and Heidi Burge, listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the world's tallest (6'4�") female identical twins, were kind enough to adopt radically different playing styles and nominally different hairstyles, but does that help when the action gets thick in the paint? (Excuse me, but did that jersey read HEA. BURGE or HEI. BURGE?) At Georgia, where there are no names on the players' backs, you have to remember uniform numbers or look for the tape around Camille's right knee.

All the above-mentioned pairs are playing for highly regarded teams. Take a quick scan of the less competitive schools and you'll find Debbie and Laura Barnes at Richmond, and Amy and Beth Dorfmeister at American.

Now, on the men's side, we have...we have...well, in Division I this year are the Wightmans, Shawn and Sean, of Western Michigan (page 56), and Jon and Joe Ross, who play for Notre Dame. Seems a bit sparse, especially when you consider that identical twin boys are born at the same rate as identical twin girls (two births per thousand).

What has caused this curious gender inequity? Theories do not abound. "I have no idea," says Georgia coach Andy Landers, echoing just about everyone who has given the matter two minutes of thought. And Landers has even had the opportunity to think about it before: In the late '70s he coached Bernadette Locke (now an assistant coach for the Kentucky men's team) and her twin, Juliet, at Roane State Community College in Harriman, Tenn.

For whatever reason—perhaps certain recruiters' moons are locked up in the house of Gemini—we have a convergence of twin talents in four prominent women's programs. So, what can these eight players teach us about the powers and perils of twinship?

?Anyone but a ref can be fooled.
When the Lowes arrived on the Georgia campus from Macon, Ga., in 1989 with the same loping run, the same infectious laugh and the same machine-gun style of talking, Landers realized that some of his assistant coaches were going to have trouble distinguishing one from the other. (Landers himself had no problem, he claims.) To keep confusion to a minimum, he had Camille wear large black spots on the front, the back and the sides of her practice jersey. One day Camille was at the other end of the court with her body turned in such a way that Landers couldn't see any spots. "I yelled, 'Camille, is that you?' " he says. "She stopped and looked down at her chest for a spot. And then she nodded."