Nyomi Hahn leads early Indiana 2028 Miss Basketball contenders

Nyomi Hahn has emerged as the early name to know in Indiana’s 2028 girls basketball class, but the first real lesson from the group is that she is not alone. Zoie Walls, Hillary Labis, Riley Schellhammer and Janaya Cooper are all on the short list as the class starts to take shape, and the conversation already feels bigger than one player because the statewide talent pool is wider than a single headliner.

That is what makes the early read on the class so interesting. The next wave is being described as one built around scoring guards and all-around playmakers, the kind of profile that usually produces more than one serious Miss Basketball candidate. In the latest statewide rankings, the 2028 group includes 150 prospects across Indiana, with Janaya Cooper, Delaney Noll, Riley Schellhammer, Suzy Perego and Nyomi Hahn filling the top five at this stage. That does not lock in a race. It does establish a starting point.

For Hahn and the others, the benchmarks are clear. Production has to keep rising. Physical development has to match the talent. Team success has to follow. Recruiting traction will matter too, because the players who stay in the center of the statewide conversation usually do more than post numbers against younger competition. They become the players opposing coaches scheme for, the ones who can carry a team deep into the postseason and still look like they have another level ahead of them.

That is the same lane Indiana Miss Basketball has traditionally rewarded. The winner is selected through online voting by media members and girls’ varsity coaches, under the direction of the Indiana Basketball Coaches Association and All-Star game director Mike Broughton. The honor also comes with the No. 1 jersey for the Indiana All-Stars in the annual series against Kentucky, a rivalry rooted in a program founded in 1939. The girls’ All-Stars were added in 1976, the junior girls followed in 1996, and the seniors have played Kentucky every year since then except 2020 because of the pandemic.

Recent winners show the standard the 2028 class will eventually have to meet. The 2026 Miss Basketball winner was a 5-11 guard from Center Grove, while the 2025 honor went to a 6-4 wing from Hamilton Southeastern. That is the bar for Hahn, Walls, Labis, Schellhammer and Cooper: stay productive, keep growing, and turn early ranking buzz into a real statewide chase.