Beavers vs Santa Clara

You’re kidding, right? On paper, the OOC schedule could have been brutal, because judging by last spring, South Carolina should have been a monster game, and Western Kentucky a legit threat. Duke isn’t performing where they should be, but that’s traditionally a big name in women’s hoops. We played #1 Notre Dame, we have Texas A&M coming up, and we played St.Mary’s, who figured to be tough given their perennial battles with Gonzaga in that league. When you play in a league like the PAC 12 in women’s hoops, I would think that 6 or 7 OOC games against strong to outstanding opponents is a pretty healthy schedule.

Now, if you really meant it when you said “honestly” (and it’s sometimes hard to tell when the message is in written form) and you were just saying that you wished that the competition was as good as it figured to be when SR and SB made the schedule, I would agree. But if you really believe that anyone in the game should schedule 9 or 10 teams that are in their range, I can’t. With that approach, one key injury and a really good team could enter league play with 5 or 6 losses, and if everything went ideally (maybe 17-3 or 16-4 in the PAC 12), they’re still likely playing in a regional at least 2 time zones away. This year’s OOC schedule, IMO, should have been almost perfectly challenging for a team aspiring to make a serious run in the tourney.

The great thing about yesterday's game was everyone got some playing time. And the Beavers played well for nearly all 40 minutes with so many different combinations. That is huge, given that when coach Rueck does finally tighten up the rotation, players (especially the 5) will have played with each other on the court. The ball movement was spectacular yesterday, even when Trish was in the game, the Beavers literally ran the same exact ball movement sequence two times down the court finding Trish for a layup. BTW, Trish played great, and, can #1, catch the ball, #2, make a layup, and #3, rebound the ball. She is already outperforming JG. Trish's conditioning though is not very good, as she was winded after 4 times down the court. Jazz on the other hand literally beat everyone down the court multiple times. I counted 3 times where she was open for a layup and we missed seeing her down court. That kid is going to be a solid contributor next year (if not this year). Plays GREAT defense for a freshman. I'm very happy with this team's progress to date.

Trish seems to be quite athletic for her height and will be a star but probably has a long way to go. It is my understanding that she was a three sport athlete in high school and did not eat and sleep basketball by being on specialty teams year around etc. In this sense she is less experienced compared to many freshman. Is this true?

Although not very athletic, you have to admit that Jo is crowd favorite.

Some of us got to watch the Saturday practice and it was very illuminating regarding Trish, Jo, etc.. Santa Clara plays a different kind of zone than pretty much anyone else, and the coaches had clear ideas about how to beat it. Watching the practice, you could tell that most of the girls got in on the first run-through. Jaz needed a little extra instruction on some details. Trish was looking like she accidentally wandered into a vector calculus class.

I don't mean that as a knock on her intelligence - it's just that these girls are being coached at an incredibly high level. It was eye-opening to see just how high the cognitive demands are on our girls. The coaches had a thorough plan, the girls had about two hours to learn it, and it was impressive to see the next day just how well the girls executed the next day.

I thought Maddie, by the way, was particularly strong in practice. We don't really see all the skills that these girls have - Janessa and Maddie give up a lot of chances to "show off" to better support the other players. Maddie had eight points in the first few minutes of the game, playing aggressively around the hoop, and she could have kept doing that all game long. But as the game went on the other players did a better job of breaking the zone down and Maddie didn't need to work like that anymore. Maddie's early points weren't part of the game plan. To most of us, it looked like, "Maddie's finally getting aggressive - yay!". Meanwhile, I'm sure the coaches were thinking, "Come on, girls, get in your damn positions so Maddie doesn't have to play like that!"

Watching that practice gave me a whole lot more appreciation for those handful of players that we've had make contributions as freshmen. That Katie actually started 10 games at point guard her freshman year is now mind-boggling to me. That Sydney Wiese started at the point her whole freshman year is jaw-dropping. It's hard to overstate just how special those girls are.

5 late minutes is 500% more than 1 late minute. 5 minutes is 1/8 of a game. It’s not insignificant. 

Perhaps the staff feels that playing against lesser ( and shorter ) competition will not do Trish that much good, but rather just reinforce the bad habits she picked up in high school. When you are that much taller than your competition you fall back on that rather than developing skills. The same also applies to being that much more athletic than your high school competition. Trish played in a weak conference and that allowed her to get by with little skill development.

People don't realize how much playing for a top program give players a leg up at the next level. Every high player has an adjustment to make coming to a top college program and the tougher the program they came from the easier it is. In Trish's case its a big learning curve. To much at once can seem over whelming.

One thing I noticed about her in highs chool that she still does is that she does not challenge shooters in front of her. I think this is because of what she was taught early in her career. Being that much taller she was told to just stand with her hands up. She has good lateral movement which is a skill tennis players use in their game constantly. But she needs to increase the space she defends in front of her. That includes jumping when the shooter is not right in front of her. She is not a slow stationary player and needs to learn to take advantage of her quickness to cover space in front of her as well as the sides.

Right now she is not maximize the advantage that her height and mobility gives her. She will not learn to do that playing against the lesser competition. You can tell just by looking at her that the reality of where she is at has finally hit her. This is good because then she knows what she needs to do the get better. But soon in time the light will come on and her advancement should accelerate.

None of what is happening with her surprises me. I have watched a lot of high school players and seen them transition from one level to the other. The good thing with Trish is that she still has a huge untapped ceiling, which would certainly allow her to begin to contribute long before she hits it.

There is no point in debating with " baseba1111". This individual seems to believe that whatever he/she professes is the gospel. I'm willing to listen, but I stop listening when there is a position taken that nothing you present can cause me to alter my view. BTW, is there an "ignore" feature on this board?