With the start of the season approaching for Humboldt State’s women’s basketball team, program head coach Michelle Bento-Jackson says the team is buzzing to tip off for the regular season.
“We’re anxious. We’re excited. We’re all the above,” she said.
The team will commence play at Western Washington University on Friday and return to the hardwood the following day to take on Seattle Pacific, both duels as part of the West Region Crossover Classic.
While the team has one exhibition win, playing to a 75-67 result over Southern Oregon at the HSU’s Lumberjack Arena, the coach stated the next games will have an entirely different feel.
“There’s just a whole other feeling when you’re opening up for a tip-off for regular-season games, let alone the caliber of play that we’re going to face at the West Region crossover classic at Seattle Pacific. It’s great competition against very high-quality division two teams, and so we’re just really anxious to get going,” she said.
With a team featuring many new faces and after a lapse in play brought on by the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the next four games will let the team test the waters going into its Dec. 2 conference opener against San Francisco State.
“It’s huge for us for a number of reasons,” Bento-Jackson said. “Obviously, yes, to prepare us for conference, but again, learning our team, how we’re going to be in certain situations. We’re starting our first three games here on the road and just traveling in general brings different components that we have to you know, different variables that we have to think about with this team. We want to learn a whole lot about our team in these first four games.”
The coach has wasted no time in identifying areas the team needs to develop.
While the preseason game saw the team’s starting five score in double digits, with players coming off the bench also contributing and a high shoot rate from the field, Bento-Jackson said she was not too satisfied with how the team’s defense handled the game.
“We weren’t really happy with our defense in that game. Defense is something that we really put a lot of emphasis on and I can tell you that after that Southern Oregon game our next three-four practices were 90% defense,” Bento-Jackson elaborated. “We know, we are bought in and we understand that (defense) is what’s going to be the critical point of us having success this year.”
“I was definitely disappointed in that area. But again, we had a good field session with both individually and collectively just so they can learn what they did and did not do and I think it was again a great learning tool… Hopefully, we’ll be better Friday night against Western Washington in that area,” she continued.
Ona more positive tenor, she points out that a balanced offense displayed in their exhibition game can stretch out opposing defenses.
“I mean, that is something that we really emphasize as far as sharing the ball and getting good quality shots,” she said. “And I think it’s just going to make our team tougher to defend stretching up a defense more when we do get contributions from all five folks out there.”
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HSU women’s basketball looking forward to season start - Eureka Times-Standard
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