With her induction into the Pennsylvania Basketball Hall of Fame, Anne Malkowiak adds another honor to her already prestigious basketball playing career.

It was a career that earned this Ellwood City High School alumna inductions into the Lawrence County and California University of Pennsylvania Basketball Halls of Fame, as well as numerous records and milestones at each school.

Despite her accomplishments at California and the numerous Hall of Fame invitations, if you ask Malkowiak what accomplishment means the most to her, she will tell you it is from her days playing at Ellwood City.

"Doing things back then has a lot more meaning to me because of where the program was when I started and where it is now," Malkowiak said.

"Back when I was coming up, we weren't a powerhouse and we had struggled many years. To help a program to go from not being respected to the point it was at after I left means a lot to me."

While playing for Ellwood City, she set what was then the WPIAL career scoring record with 2,368 points. That mark still stands as the most in Lawrence County girls' basketball, although it has been surpassed by several other WPIAL players. Malkowiak's 59 points in one game, along with her career free-throw percentage (93 percent) and single-season scoring mark (773), all remain the standard at Ellwood City.

She joins such basketball legends as Wilt Chamberlain, Kobe Bryant, Sam Bowie, Dick Groat, Connie Hawkins, and "Pistol Pete" Maravich in the state basketball Hall of Fame. The inductees are primarily males with a few notable exceptions, including Dawn Staley and Kelly Mazzante.

"Any time a female athlete can get any type of recognition, not only does it mean a lot to her but it does for all female athletes. Female sports have come along way."

The Pennsylvania Girls' Roundball Classic has come along way, too, since its first year in 1989, when Malkowiak was named MVP. The players have come so far in terms of talent that Malkowiak might think twice before suiting up against some of the female basketball players in the state today.

"They are a lot better athletes and they are better trained. Some of the kids on our team [currently at California] I couldn't keep up with them. I could shoot with them but athletically these kids would put me to shame," Malkowiak said.

She became only the eighth player at California to surpass 1,000 career points and was a three-year starter for head coach Paul Flores, twice helping Cal to the playoffs and earning team MVP in 1991 while compiling the highest 3-point shooting percentage (37.8 percent) in school history.

It was only a span of 15 days between her inductions into the California University and Lawrence County basketball Halls of Fame. She had to wait more than seven years before the Pennsylvania hall called her name.

"When I found out about the first two, I was extremely honored. I really had no concept of the Pennsylvania Basketball Hall of Fame."

She is still at Cal, working in the athletics fundraising and promotions department and also volunteers a lot of her time to the school.

At Cal, she received an undergraduate degree in 1993 in elementary education and came back to earn her master's in special education in 1996. She previously coached the girls' team at California Area High School for two seasons starting in 1996.