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Yeowomen Fall To Wittenberg

Young Yeowomen Struggle to Refine Team Play

by John Damron

Bank That Baby! A Yeowoman baller takes it to the hole in practice. (photo by Lea Morgenstern)

If you've ever built a lawnmower from its bare parts, you'll know that the first time you try to run it, there are going to be some things that go wrong. This analogy is very comparable to the women's basketball team.

The first few mowing attempts have been rough ones as the Lady Crimson currently hold a 1-7 record overall and a 0-2 record in the conference.

Their recent home loss came against conference-power Wittenberg University 70-52. But in each contest, little things have gone wrong that show the team's inexperience.

Head Coach Ann Gilbert has built the Lady Crimson basketball team with only a few returning players, including a pair of sisters 5-11 junior Heather Barbee and 5- 11 sophomore Rachel Barbee, and 5-6 junior guard Nzinga Broussard. The rest of the team is all first-years, who will naturally take some time to mesh with the rest of the machine. So it will just be a matter of time before the Lady Crimson mow through their schedule smoothly.

The Lady Crimson have had some bright spots this season, but they haven't yet been able to put them all together simultaneously. First-year guard Malisha Richardson and Broussard, who team up to be quite a 1-2 combo' according to Gilbert, have had periodic flashes of brilliance. With the continuation of their hard work - which takes on a whole new definition "once a player reaches the college level" Gilbert said, the whole team will play up to their potential.

One area that the Lady Crimson is striving to improve is their inside game.

"It has been our number one weakness" Gilbert pointed out. The Lady Crimson were only down seven points at half time of the Wittenberg game, and were competing very closely. The main reason is they were winning the battle of the offensive rebounds, 27-21.

Then, in the second half, it seemed that unless someone crashed the boards to bring one down, they couldn't get a rebound simply by boxing out. When it appeared that Wittenberg was making a run, Richardson brought a halt to their momentum when she flew in for a rebound then hit back-to-back three-pointers to bring the score to 43 - 35.

"She's got mad range," Gilbert said.

With nine minutes to play, first-year guard Amber Coleman provided a spark off the bench when she hit two of three foul shots, then grabbed a rebound, and took it coast to coast for another deuce to bring the score to 52-44.

The Barbee sisters have been the steady factors on the boards, pulling down almost half the team's total (17 of 43) against Wittenberg. But Gilbert expects to get more points out of Heather, mainly in the form of put-backs. Also, when first-years Emily Wells and Alisha Thomas get more adept at the college game, the Lady Crimson game should be solid.

"The best is ahead of us," Gilbert said.

The Lady Crimson will host the Christmas Tournament the weekend after Christmas, Dec. 29 and 30. There are evening games starting at 5:30 p.m. on Friday, and afternoon games starting at 1 p.m. on Saturday. Their next home game after the Lady Crimson Christmas Tournament is against Allegheny College on Wednesday, January 10 at 7:30 p.m..

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Copyright © 2000, The Oberlin Review.
Volume 129, Number 12, December 15, 2000

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