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NBA Power Rankings from Around the Internet
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Buckeyes grab 18 players on signing day
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Garfield at Buchtel basketball
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Collector Car Hobby Loses One of the Best—Jim Roll
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Decisions Decisions: Credit Cards or Your Mortgage?
Ohio Travels with Betty:
Loucile is looking for a Lake Erie getaway in June for three kids, ages 1, 3, and 5.
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Talk of the Town – Top entertainment picks for the weekend
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Track HR Research
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Makers of 'Castle Crashers' unveil 'BattleBlock Theater'
See Jane Style:
Do IT this week: Layering
By Jonas Fortune
Beacon Journal staff writer
POSTED: 09:02 p.m. EST, Nov 11, 2009
KENT: Preseason polls place the Kent State women's basketball team in the same place they finished last season, second place in the Mid-American Conference East Division.
The Golden Flashes earned 12 first-place votes, trailing only Bowling Green (22 votes), as voted on by MAC coaches and 24 members of the media two weeks ago.
To live up to those expectations though, Kent State must find a way to replace its leading scorer, rebounder and shot blocker from a year ago, graduated center Anna Kowalska.
''That is an ongoing process for us right now,'' Kent State coach Bob Lindsay said last week in a phone interview. ''We've got three players in Kowalska's position and they are probably going to be doing it by committee.''
Senior Lorriane Odhiambo, junior Ellie Shields and freshman Leslie Schaefer will all play center this season and will attempt to replace the 16.1 points, 8.1 rebounds and 51 blocked shots — 45 more than any other player on the team last season — that Kowalska brought to the Flashes.
Shields averaged 1.8 points and rebounds last season in 8.8 minutes per game, but she has returned this season in better physical shape, Lindsay said. Odhiambo, a native of Kenya, averaged 1.5 points and 1.8 points in 6.7 minutes per game last season and has shown more improvement as she has learned the game, Lindsay said.
The frontcourt will obviously be a work in progress, but the Flashes will return their entire backcourt.
Redshirt junior guard Jamilah Humes, who averaged 11.4 points last year, and fifth-year senior Rachel Bennett (10 points, 4.52 assists per game) create a tough tandem that can give opposing defenses fits.
''Bennett always gets better,'' Lindsay said. ''She works really hard at her game . . . She has improved her game quite a bit.''
Joining them will be junior facilitator Stephanie Gibson (3.76 assists per game, .484 from 3-point range) and sophomore Jena Stutzman, who averaged 8.4 points in her first collegiate season.
Stutzman showed glimpses of what could be last season when she was the leading scorer in six games, and she has improved this season, Lindsay said.
But is she ready to be one of the main scorers for the Flashes?
''Jena has to think of herself that way,'' Lindsay said. ''She is really happy to be part of the offense but not the main part of the offense . . . She has to be a little more selfish at times, looking to shoot the ball.''
The Flashes open the season at 7 p.m. Friday at Robert Morris in Moon Township, Pa.
Jonas Fortune can be reached at jfortune@thebeaconjournal.com. Read the Varsity Letters high school sports blog at http://www.ohiomm.com/blogs/varsity_letters/. Also on Twitter at http://twitter.com/ABJ_Preps.
KENT: Preseason polls place the Kent State women's basketball team in the same place they finished last season, second place in the Mid-American Conference East Division.
The Golden Flashes earned 12 first-place votes, trailing only Bowling Green (22 votes), as voted on by MAC coaches and 24 members of the media two weeks ago.
To live up to those expectations though, Kent State must find a way to replace its leading scorer, rebounder and shot blocker from a year ago, graduated center Anna Kowalska.
''That is an ongoing process for us right now,'' Kent State coach Bob Lindsay said last week in a phone interview. ''We've got three players in Kowalska's position and they are probably going to be doing it by committee.''
Senior Lorriane Odhiambo, junior Ellie Shields and freshman Leslie Schaefer will all play center this season and will attempt to replace the 16.1 points, 8.1 rebounds and 51 blocked shots — 45 more than any other player on the team last season — that Kowalska brought to the Flashes.
Shields averaged 1.8 points and rebounds last season in 8.8 minutes per game, but she has returned this season in better physical shape, Lindsay said. Odhiambo, a native of Kenya, averaged 1.5 points and 1.8 points in 6.7 minutes per game last season and has shown more improvement as she has learned the game, Lindsay said.
The frontcourt will obviously be a work in progress, but the Flashes will return their entire backcourt.
Redshirt junior guard Jamilah Humes, who averaged 11.4 points last year, and fifth-year senior Rachel Bennett (10 points, 4.52 assists per game) create a tough tandem that can give opposing defenses fits.
''Bennett always gets better,'' Lindsay said. ''She works really hard at her game . . . She has improved her game quite a bit.''
Joining them will be junior facilitator Stephanie Gibson (3.76 assists per game, .484 from 3-point range) and sophomore Jena Stutzman, who averaged 8.4 points in her first collegiate season.
Stutzman showed glimpses of what could be last season when she was the leading scorer in six games, and she has improved this season, Lindsay said.
But is she ready to be one of the main scorers for the Flashes?
''Jena has to think of herself that way,'' Lindsay said. ''She is really happy to be part of the offense but not the main part of the offense . . . She has to be a little more selfish at times, looking to shoot the ball.''
The Flashes open the season at 7 p.m. Friday at Robert Morris in Moon Township, Pa.
Jonas Fortune can be reached at jfortune@thebeaconjournal.com. Read the Varsity Letters high school sports blog at http://www.ohiomm.com/blogs/varsity_letters/. Also on Twitter at http://twitter.com/ABJ_Preps.
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