Editor’s Note: Dispatch sports editor Adam Minichino will talk to Southeastern Conference women’s basketball coaches every week to keep you updated on the latest from a league that this week has five teams ranked in the top 12 of The Associated Press Top 25.
Matt Insell is looking forward to January.
It’s not that the Ole Miss women’s basketball coach is discounting the importance of his team’s final nine games in 2015.
Far from it.
Insell knows remaining games this year against non-conference opponents like Stony Brook (Friday), Wagner (Sunday), Western Kentucky (Dec. 2), Southern Mississippi (Dec. 12), and Tulane (Dec. 16) will help bolster his team’s resume for NCAA tournament consideration.
But Insell views those games and the other four his team will play to complete the first part of its season as preparation for the 16-game Southeastern Conference schedule. That marathon will kick off at 2 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 3, 2016, against Vanderbilt at Tad Smith Coliseum. The game against Vanderbilt will be the team’s last one in Tad Smith Coliseum before it moves into The Pavilion at Ole Miss.
Insell has confidence the Rebels will have things figured out by the time they make that move.
“Our job is to get us ready to January,” Insell said earlier this month. “We’re going to be real good in January.”
Insell made those comments following an 82-78 loss to Louisiana-Lafayette on Nov. 15. Since then, Ole Miss has lost to Missouri State (91-78 on Nov. 19) and to Middle Tennessee State (84-75) on Nov. 22. While concerned about his team’s slow starts, Insell likes the versatility, athleticism, and depth on this year’s team. The SEC media and coaches shared Insell’s confidence when they picked Ole Miss sixth and seventh, respectively, in the league’s preseason poll. It is the first time Ole Miss has been picked in the top half of the league since it expanded to 14 teams.
But with five freshmen and 11 of 13 players in only their second season in the program,. Insell knows there will be growing pains. In addition to finding someone to replace leading scorer and rebounder Tia Faleru, Ole Miss is trying to develop a consistent perimeter shooting threat to replace Gracie Frizzell, who passed up her final year of eligibility to go to physical therapy school.
Insell believes juniors Bretta Hart and Shequila Joseph, sophomore Kelsey Briggs, and freshman Cecilia Muhate Pena are candidates to replace the 14.6 points and 9.8 rebounds a game the Rebels lost when Faleru graduated.
“I think Bretta Hart can take over Tia’s rebounding,” Insell said. “Shequila Joseph, Kelsey Briggs, and Cecilia Muhate all have the ability to be good rebounders, but which one of you can step up and rebound the ball? The player who is going to play at that spot is going to rebound.”
Against Middle Tennessee State, Joseph had 14 of her 20 in the third quarter of her first start since the 2014-15 season opener. It was her second-consecutive game in double figures, and her first back-to-back games in double figures since her freshman season. She also had eight rebounds.
Against Louisiana-Lafayette, freshman guard Torri Lewis hit six 3-pointers in the fourth quarter en route to a career-high 20 points. Hart added a career-high 19 rebounds, but Ole Miss couldn’t overcome a 20-point halftime deficit.
“Torri knows how to play the game offensively, but she never has been asked to play the game defensively like we’re playing it,” Insell said. “Not that she can’t do it, it’s just that she doesn’t know how to do it. She is learning how to do it every day. She takes charges and hustles and is making steady progress every day. … I was really happy with her and that she made shots. She is an incredible shooter. It wasn’t a surprise to me (what she did against Louisiana-Lafayette).”
Insell said junior guard Erika Sisk, a transfer from Murray State, is “learning how to be a leader.” He said he talks with Sisk every day about how to handle different responsibilities and how to stay focused and not allow mistakes or missed shots frustrate her.
“She is a work in progress when it comes to being a leader,” Insell said.
In many ways, that’s the same philosophy Insell is taking with his team. It applies to the backcourt, where sophomore A’Queen Hayes, a member of the SEC’s All-Freshman Team last season, sophomores Shandricka Sessom and Kiara Golden and freshmen Alissa Alston and Madinah Muhammad are all learning how to play in Insell’s system, which is predicated on defensive intensity, energy, and tempo.
Insell said it is a positive sign for a future that Ole Miss has had so much youth on the court and has been able to rally from deficits in the past three games. Now he wants the Rebels bring the focus at the start of games so they don’t have to worry about fourth-quarter rallies.
“I think a lot of it has to do with our youth,” Insell said. “We don’t really have a leader. We are still trying to feel around to see who that leader is and if people will follow who I want that leader to be.”
Ole Miss (1-3) will play at 1 p.m. Friday at Stony Brook and at noon Sunday at Wagner. It will play host to Western Kentucky at 6 p.m. Wednesday.
South Carolina in Hawaii for Thanksgiving
Dawn Staley doesn’t mind a little traveling if it means her No. 2 South Carolina women’s basketball team is going to play good competition.
After opening the season with a game against then-No. 6 Ohio State, South Carolina played North Carolina Greensboro and then hit the road to play at Clemson and at UCLA. The last game was closer than some might have expected (68-65 on Sunday), but it served as the final warmup for South Carolina before its trip to the Waikiki Beach Marriott Rainbow Wahine Showdown. South Carolina will face No. 16 Arizona State at 6:30 p.m. Friday. It will play California State University, Bakersfield at 5:30 p.m. Saturday, and Hawaii at 9 p.m. Sunday.
South Carolina enters the weekend in an unusual place — seventh in the SEC in field goal percentage (44.5 percent). The Gamecocks have led the SEC in shooting percentage the past two seasons (48.4 percent in 2014-15 and 47.4 in 2013-14), which helps explain their rise to national prominence. South Carolina went 29-5 and reached the Sweet 16 in 2013-14 and went 34-3 and advanced to the Final Four last season.
Staley, a former All-America guard at Virginia, didn’t hesitate when asked to explain how her team finished fourth and sixth in the nation in field goal percentage the past two seasons.
“Post play,” Staley said. “The first two years that we shot under 40 percent, we played with undersized post players. Although they were pretty heady post players, you need length playing against people four or five inches taller than you. They make it real difficult to score over them or around them time and time again. When we got some bigs in here, we were able to put them in position where they can be effective and that shooting percentage will skyrocket.”
A’ja Wilson, Alaina Coates, and Virginia transfer Sarah Imovbioh lead South Carolina in field goal percentage at 47.1 percent, 73.3, and 75. All three are shooting 59.8 percent from the field, which makes the team’s overall shooting percentage even more puzzling.
But reigning SEC Player of the Year Tiffany Mitchell is shooting 42.6 percent from the field even though she is leading the team in scoring (15 points per game). Starters Tina Roy, a senior guard, and senior guard Khadijah Sessions, another senior guard, are shooting 32.4 percent and 33.3 percent, respectively.
Don’t expect those percentages to continue.
Staley has stressed “taking the right type of shots,” which means the Gamecocks are going to rely on an inside-out game to get their guards good looks.
With post players like Wilson, a 6-foot-5 sophomore forward, Coates, a 6-4 junior center, Imovbioh, a 6-2 forward, and Jatarie White, a 6-4 sophomore forward, South Carolina is one of the biggest teams in the SEC. Their presence should help Staley’s program remain among the nation’s leaders in field goal percentage. In Staley’s first five seasons at South Carolina, the Gamecocks shot better than 40 percent from the field once.
Staley’s success with post players at South Carolina mirrors the plan she followed at temple in her first job as a head coach. Staley’s teams at Temple had their best field goal percentage figures during the years of 6-2 forward Candice Dupree, who is still playing in the WNBA. Dupree shot better than 50 percent from the field in her final three seasons. As a team, Temple had three of the top four shooting percentages in Staley’s eight seasons as coach.
“I tell all of our players if you shoot 50 percent or better can take any type you want, but it also means if you do you’re taking the right type of shots,” Staley said. “It is something for them to strive for.”
As a former point guard, it isn’t surprising to hear Staley say there is a lot that goes into making shots. She said the Gamecocks work hard to make sure players know how to deliver passes to teammates that put them in a position where they don’t have to think about shooting.
“When you understand the importance of all of the other parts of making the shot, you become a better team,” Staley said. “It takes everybody on the floor to understand what it takes to shooting a pretty high percentage.”
Staley said South Carolina doesn’t set a goal or talk about its overall field goal percentage. She believes things will take care of themselves if the passers do their part to set up their teammates the right way.
“We do talk about shot selection a lot because some of our players, bless their heart, some of them don’t shoot the ball extremely well and they don’t remember missed shots. They only remember made shots. They don’t remember the shots they miss. They remember the one that they make and those 10 that they miss are a distant memory.
“As coaches we have to remind them you’re shooting 10 percent, so let’s get this ball into someone’s hands who gives us a better opportunity to score and look good. It also allows them to make an impact in other areas.”
Season of firsts for Taylor
This will continue to be a season of firsts for Joni Taylor.
The 1997 Gatorade Player of the Year in the state of Mississippi at Meridian High School is in her first season as head coach at Georgia.
On Sunday, April 12, Taylor, who was an associate head coach at Georgia, officially replaced Andy Landers as head coach of one of the game’s most storied programs.
Landers, the only previous full-time women’s basketball coach in the program’s history, announced his retirement on March 16 after 36 seasons. He compiled a 862-299 record at Georgia, making him one of only seven college basketball coaches — women’s or men’s — to record 850 wins at one NCAA Division I school. The other coaches on that list are: Pat Summitt (Tennessee), Jim Boeheim (Syracuse), Mike Krzyzewski (Duke), Geno Auriemma (Connecticut), Dean Smith (North Carolina), and Adolph Rupp (Kentucky).
Taylor earned her first victory as a head coach Nov. 15 in a 76-55 decision against Stetson. Three days later, she earned her first loss in a 66-45 setback at Michigan State.
Georgia has rebounded from the loss to beat archrival Georgia Tech and Georgia Southern. The latest victory on Tuesday was the program’s 50th consecutive home win against a non-conference foe. The 75-28 win also helped Georgia tie the fewest points it has allowed in a game in the NCAA era of women’s basketball, which spans back to the 1981-82 season.
Taylor hopes to engineer more highlights like that after a season in which Georgia went 19-12 (6-10 in the SEC) and didn’t advance to the NCAA tournament. A season-ending injury (fractured fibula) to guard/forward Shacobia Barbee short-circuited Georgia’s season. Without Barbee, Georgia went 2-8 down the stretch.
This season, Barbee is back with an experienced cast that includes senior guard Tiaria Griffin, who played at Hattiesburg High, senior forward Merritt Hempe, senior Marjorie Butler, and sophomore Mackenzie Engram, who was named to the SEC’s All-Freshman Team last season.
Following her first victory, Taylor thanked her players for supporting her. When asked to expand on why she made the comment, Taylor said she and her coaching staff have asked a lot more from the players and are trying to change the team’s style of play. She also said the team has done more community service, so the players have had to make adjustments on and off the court.
“With the rule changes to how we play, we want to play a lot faster, and that is going to require more conditioning,” Taylor said. “From a basketball standpoint, we have amped up our conditioning and are doing things they’re not used to. We’re trying to stress them on the floor. They have not complained once, or asked why (we’re doing something). … They have embraced it.”
Taylor credits Landers for giving her a lot of responsibilities in her four years on his staff. She said that time eased her transition to head coach because the players “got used to hearing my voice” and were disciplined by her and had fun with her. Taylor believes her team will be conditioned to handle the women’s game’s move to quarters, which could feature longer stretches of play without designated timeouts. She hopes the work she and her staff put in in the offseason helps the team realize more firsts, including a return to the NCAA tournament for a first-year head coach.
“The last few seasons, injuries and roster things dictated how we had to play,” Taylor said. “We want to get back to playing and thinking at a higher level and a faster level. I want the players to be able to make decisions fast when they are tired. We are training them to play fast and smart.”
Follow Dispatch sports editor Adam Minichino on Twitter @ctsportseditor
Adam Minichino is the former Sports Editor for The Commercial Dispatch.
You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 37 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.