Progress is the motto for this year's women's basketball team. The Badgers won 10 games in the 2003-'04 season, 12 in 2004-'05 and will look to move into the upper half of the Big Ten in head coach Lisa Stone's third season at the helm. The squad returns three starters and nine players overall from last year's team, including sophomore point guard Jolene Anderson, who was named to the preseason All-Big Ten team.
Anderson comes into the season with tons of expectations. Last year she led the team in scoring-per-game (17.8) and finished second in rebound-per-game (5.6) and assists-per-game (3.36). She spent her summer polishing her game and winning a gold medal with the women's national 19 and under team in Tunisia.
Last year's point guard and leader Stephanie Rich graduated therefore Anderson will assume a lot of the ball handing duties. Anderson is unphased by the changing of the guard.
'Not with the new swing offense,' Anderson said. 'All of our players play all the spots.' The team will run an offense similar to the men's team, where all the players' roles are interchangeable. Sophomore shooting guard Janese Banks can handle the ball as well, allowing Anderson to play off the ball, where she should get more open looks. Banks is an aggressive player, who got to the line more than twice as many times as any of her teammates last season. Another year under her belt should help tremendously.
'Janese and I now realize what we mean to the team and what we have to do to get the program in the right direction,' Anderson said.
The Badgers struggled on the defensive end of the floor this past season. They were last in the league in scoring defense, allowing 73.1 points per game. The team was undersized and had trouble defending the paint. To compensate, the Badgers packed the paint and allowed teams to shoot a league-worst 37 percent from the 3-point line. In response, Coach Stone brought in Tasha McDowell from UC-Santa Barbara to serve as a 'defensive coordinator' for the squad.
'Coach felt that defense was the Achilles' heel last season,' coach McDowell said. 'With my coming in, one of the things we wanted to do was change the whole mentality of the defense and not just react to teams, but to dictate how teams are allowed to run their offense ... we're working on more of a team defensive concept where everyone knows that someone has their back somewhere.'
Last year, the Badgers improved from the previous season in points per game (+11), rebounds per game (+1.2) and turnovers per game (-.3). With senior leadership provided by the four captains, improved defense, a solid freshman class led by 6'4'' Caitlin Gibson and the maturity of Anderson and Banks, the Badgers will look to improve even more this season. The Badgers have their eyes set on their first NCAA tournament birth since 2002. Now, that would be progress.
