Women’s basketball
Looking at the box score, Amy Williams’ first win at USD involved some of the same grit that marked the effort of last year’s team, though it was executed without a lot of last year’s players. That’s a good sign for a team that appears like it may be struggling at the offensive end occasionally.
Early in the season, I’m always curious about how the minutes are working out. On that count, we had a boxscore that said this: Pam January 27, Polly Harrington 20, Tempestt Wilson 26, Alexis Yackley 35, Nicole Seekamp 33, Tia Hemiller 3, Sam Mehr 17, Margaret McCloud 14, Heidi Hoff 6, Lisa Loeffler 19.
It looks like Wilson and Harrington both dealt with foul trouble, so that would have affected their playing time, as well as that of their replacements.
Drake is not the same team it was last year that got beat in the WNIT at the DakotaDome. The squad has one senior and was picked to finish ninth in the MVC this year.
That’s not to belittle the win. The Coyotes shot well inside the arc (24-49), were able to take a 16-point second-half lead and hold on despite not making a field goal over the last 5:45, that’s where the spirit of last year’s team comes through. The Coyotes endured huge shooting slumps 2011-12 and routinely hung on to win games.
The season is long and I’ve yet to see the team play, so no declarations coming from here on how they’ll do this season. It looks to me, though, that they’re going to have to figure out a way to get some points out of some players who have been in the program for a while and not scored much so far at USD. You could also say, judging from a 49-44 rebounding edge, that Williams has them playing hard.
