She arrived quietly in the doorway, backpack still on, a blue Penn State coat still draped on her arms. The calm she brings, highlighted with a smile fixed on her face, is typical of the senior center for the Penn State women's basketball team. Her grin does not disappear, not even for the slightest second. It is genuine and disarming, welcoming even to the most distant stranger.

But there is something more revealing of Amanda Brown's personality than her smile. In her hands, clutched to her chest, she holds a dark green binder with a thick textbook inside, still embracing the binder after the end of her psychology class. Sitting in a conference room, she constantly tugs at the edges of the plastic binding and picks at the sticker still fastened to the spine lying on the polished wooden table.

As she plays with the binder, she cannot forget the role that not only basketball, but also education, has played in her life as her final Lady Lion season draws to a close.

"[Education] was definitely something that was stressed growing up," Brown said. "My parents always said academics first, even before basketball. I never really struggled with academics. I always did fairly well, and so it wasn't hard for me, but they definitely stressed the fact that I need to get my homework done and do well, and then everything else comes after that."

More than the 13 double-doubles this season, more than her selection to the First Team All-Big Ten list, and more than reaching the 1,000-point plateau, Brown values her academic achievements as the most important of her accolades. Graduating from high school with at 4.2 GPA and being named to the Big Ten All-Academic team twice, her scholastic awards are as numerous as her achievements on the basketball court.

"She is a bit of a perfectionist," Brown's mother, Cheryl, said. "Whatever she does, she wants to do the best job she can. So she wants to work hard at her schoolwork, and she works hard at her basketball. I think, honestly, what she sacrifices is really a social life. She realizes that, and that's something that she minds doing. She likes to get those A's and try and do the best she can do in basketball. She is very driven."

This drive has propelled her into the national spotlight as well. Brown is one of only 10 senior basketball players from around the nation named as finalists for the Lowe's Senior CLASS Award, honoring her achievements off the court. She was also invited to apply for a post-graduate degree scholarship and named to the ESPN the Magazine Academic All-District team.

As a senior majoring in life science with minors in psychology and human development and family studies, Brown must juggle intense courses with basketball practice. Penn State head coach Rene Portland said Brown is currently taking two courses during the season that are "two of the ugliest things you would never want to take." Because she plays for the Canadian National team in the summer, demanding courses overlap with the rigorous Big Ten season, and unlike many athletes, she cannot lighten her course load by putting some courses off until the summer.

"It is amazing that she's able to have that kind of discipline," Portland said. "I can remember a few weeks ago I was talking to the kids about how you really have to buckle down, and we really push the time management piece. And I said, 'How many of you like Amanda got up at eight o'clock on Saturday and did schoolwork?' And I said to Amanda, 'Did you do that?' She said, 'Yeah, I did.' And the rest of them looked at her like, why would you want to do that? I never have to worry about her taking foul shots or giving us her 50 shots in the gym or 100 shots in the gym. Her time management skills are like lots of other Lady Lions that we've had but a great example for the young kids."

***

When her two oldest daughters were growing up, Cheryl Brown noticed something peculiar about their play habits. Rather than speak English, the language spoken by Cheryl, a Canadian from Alberta, and her husband Andy, who is from England, Amanda and her older sister Shanna conversed in French when they played with their dolls. Living in an entirely French-speaking town just outside of Montreal the girls had learned French simply by playing with other neighborhood children. As a product of these intersecting cultures, Brown was bilingual at the age of 18 months.

It was in Canada that Brown's basketball days began. Although only in third grade at St. Bruno Elementary, her gym teacher asked her to play on the fourth, fifth and sixth grade teams with Shanna. Brown was one of the best players in the league although she was younger than most of her competition, and her superior skill continued when the family moved to a Kennett Square when she was 10.

After a successful high school career, Brown narrowed her college choices to Stanford, Virginia, Duke and Penn State. However, her strong desire to remain close to her family influenced her final decision.

"Penn State really was the best fit for me just because it wasn't too far away from home," Brown said. "I'd come to games and watch them play, and I really wanted to be a part of Penn State. My sister came to Penn State, and she was a senior when I was a freshman here, so that definitely made me more aware of how special Penn State is."

The support of Brown's family -- her mother attends every home game, and her father attends every weekend home game -- has played an integral role in her development as a person and player.

"My parents have really been there for me," Brown said. "They haven't been the coaching type. They haven't been the type to pressure me into things or told me that I didn't play well enough. They've really been so supportive of me whether I've had a good game or a bad night, they will always focus on the positive, what I did well, and that's really helped me throughout my career."

Reflecting that love for her family, it was only fitting that her youngest sister, Alyssa, sang the National Anthem before Brown's final game at the Bryce Jordan Center on Sunday.

When she trained with the Canadian National Team after her freshman year, Brown was finally able to return to the Canadian roots that played such an influential role in her early childhood.

"Playing for the Canadian team has been some of the great source of pride for her at the moment," Andy said. "[Her upbringing] helped her to accept other cultures and know what it's like to live in not just a different country, but a country where you need to know a couple of different languages. She's very, very proud of her heritage."

***

It was dinnertime after one of Brown's workouts with the Canadian National Team, and the Penn State rising junior had two guests. Portland and her assistant coach Susan Robinson Fruchtl came to see Brown at one of her workouts to show their support. They also came to discuss an important issue, one that Brown seemed hesitant to accept. Portland put a leadership workbook on the table, and thus began the transformation of a reluctant leader into a two-year captain.

"Knowing her personality and knowing probably the process that she was going to take as a captain, I found a book that would help her and us work together," Portland said. "She was the first one I did it with, just showing her that it wasn't gonna be, 'be a leader and figure it out,' that we were going to give her the groundwork that I was with her the whole time. That was a great start of building a foundation of her accepting it. I have to give her all the credit. After we got the ball rolling, she really ran with it, and the kids really respect her."

Brown has always had a quiet, kind demeanor. Her parents describe her as one to instruct rather than yell or tell someone what to do, and her quietness may have at first seemed like a drawback in her leadership qualities. However, as the only member of her class who had been at the school since her freshman year, she accepted the responsibility and has led the Lady Lions in her own way.

"People do draw to her," Cheryl said. "She is the team psychiatrist. Everybody comes to her with her problems. She's not a screamer. She doesn't put pressure on people. She's just a very quiet leader but very effective, because I know the girls love her to pieces."

One of the most overt signs of respect for their senior leader came last week when the players all wore her pink replica jerseys to the team film session. When Brown rushed through the door after one of her classes, the entire team said, "We love you, Amanda." Not too long before, the players had all declared that their New Year's resolution was to be like Amanda Brown. Portland said that Brown got "teary eyed" after seeing her teammates pay her such a tribute.

***

As she grips the dark green binder, her casual jeans and sneakers topped with a white T-shirt and a silver heart necklace present a startling contrast to her usual appearance in blue and white game-day warm-ups. For a few hours at least, she appears to be a regular college student. Next year, as Brown wanders about the Penn State campus finishing her degree, she will have to get used to being a normal student. She will not have to rush to practice. No late night games or long trips out of town. And perhaps most disappointingly, no spot on the Lady Lions roster.

"Throughout my career, what I'm going to remember most is the experiences I've had with my teammates, my relationships I've made," Brown said. "Not that I won't be around, it just won't be the same team atmosphere with them. I'm going to have some of these relationships for the rest of my life, so that's something that's really special to me."

Although she is pursuing her undergraduate degree, she is not giving up on basketball just yet. This summer, the Canadian team will be trying to qualify for the Olympics, and after placing 10th in the 2006 FIBA World Championships, the goal looks attainable. She said that if she were given the opportunity to play in the WNBA, she wouldn't turn it down. However, child psychiatry remains a career ambition, and she would like to attend medical school at some point in her future.

As her career at Penn State draws to a close, besides the memories and the lessons in leadership, her experiences as a Lady Lion have made an indelible mark on her character.

"It's a great feeling. It's a great thing to be a Lady Lion," Brown said. "You look at the tradition that Lady Lion basketball has had and just the people that have been on that court or just the people that have been in the past of Lady Lion basketball, and it's an amazing feeling to be part of something so big and so special."