JANE LEE
Sports Editor
They are young, but do not let their youth fool you. They are not the men’s basketball team, but do not think they don’t have a new offensive style of their own. They are coming off a West Coast Conference championship season, but do not think it was a one-time thing.
Meet the women’s basketball team, which enters the 2006-2007 campaign along with Loyola Marymount as the preseason favorite to claim the WCC’s regular-season title.
“We’re still kind of young and we have a tough schedule, so every game is going to be a challenge,” sophomore guard Jessica Ross said. “Everyone is going to be gunning for us since we’re the reigning conference champions and we got picked to get first in the conference.”
Head Coach Julie Rousseau’s Waves are following a 14-17 season, one that began slowly and never picked up speed until the final month of the team’s regular-season schedule. They started the season 1-6 and lost 11 of their first 14 games, making it seem like a “wait until next year” season.
The unpredictable craziness that is March Madness, however, led Pepperdine to three victories in four days at the WCC tournament in Spokane, Wash., giving them an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament in Denver.
Although the Waves lost 78-66 to No.-2 seed Oklahoma in a first-round match-up, Pepperdine gained valuable experience, something they are working off of this year.
“Even though we’re young, we have a lot of experience on the team,” Ross said. “I think the difference in this year’s team is attitude and energy, and after winning conference last year, we just want to go back and repeat that.”
Pepperdine returns 11 letterwinners from a year ago, including senior forward Jasmane Clarendon and junior guard Daphanie Kennedy, both of whom were All-WCC selections in 2006. Kennedy returns as the team’s leading scorer after averaging 12.6 points a game while Clarendon tallied 11.5 points and a team-high 6.9 rebounds a game.
Rousseau welcomes four newcomers to the roster, including freshman forward and center Teena Wickett, who was invited to USA Basketball’s Under-18 National Team Trials this past summer.
“Our freshmen are a talented group of players,” Rousseau said. “It remains to be seen how they can adjust to college life, including academically. We are hopeful they can make the transition smoothly because our goal is to make them successful NCAA student-athletes.”
Freshman Miranda Ayim is one such newcomer, and she said the team’s approach to regular-season preparation was the team’s key to success during the offseason.
“We did a lot of running and conditioning,” Ayim said. “We’re already running the floor better and we have implemented a new offense.”
Ayim calls the new addition a “flex offense,” one that allows the team several options on the court for scoring opportunities.
“The new offense involves more motion as opposed to running a lot of sets,” Rousseau said. “We’re going to be less stagnant out there. We’ve put in a lot of time to practicing with it, and the kids are seeing where we have the advantage. It’s a welcoming addition, and I think they’re having fun with it.”
Ross said the new offense is a welcoming addition.
“I think the new offense is helping us push the ball up the court more,” she said. “It displays our versatility and our depth, so we just need to combine that with unity, and then I know we have the talent to do well.”
Rousseau hopes the offense, as well as other key factors, can make up for obvious challenges facing the team.
“Our youth is obviously our biggest challenge, so they’re going to have to be able to learn from their experiences, and they have great leaders to help them with that,” she said. “The kids have to stick with the new program all season long.
“Last year we did not click on all cylinders until the end, but this year we start out against a lot of ranked opponents, so hopefully our schedule prepares us for conference play.”
Conference play does not begin until Jan. 5 against Gonzaga, but the Waves still have several teams to test out their new offense against before that time. With two exhibition wins under their belt, Pepperdine opens regular-season play Friday at Texas A&M.
“We’re looking forward to finally getting out there and playing some regular-season games,” Ayim said. “I believe our keys to success will be taking care of the ball because the more possessions we have, the more baskets we have. Also, we can run the floor really well because we have a lot of athleticism on the team.”
In the preseason polls in which Pepperdine was picked with Loyola Marymount to claim the league’s regular-season title, the Waves received four of eight first-place votes and totaled 57 points as did the Lions. Along with Gonzaga, Loyola Marymount split the other four first-place votes. The Bulldogs picked up 53 total points for third, while Santa Clara (33), Saint Mary’s (28), San Diego (24), San Francisco (23) and Portland (13) rounded out the coach’s preseason voting.
11-09-2006
