Made my way over to the Butler Center early last evening to take in this Thursday evening practice by the St. Kate's Wildcats. There has been a lot of renovation work already completed at the Butler Center since late this last spring and more is currently underway. A new reception desk greets people as they enter the building and a newly refurbished lobby area upstairs adjacent to the arena is very spacious. By December, new locker rooms will be in place as well. Arguably, this renovation work will give St. Kate's a new identity it has been seeking for some time.
Before practice, I spent some time with Assistant Coach Tim Kjar and Head Coach Sean Pinkerton and also got to meet new Assistant Coach Tim Peper as well. You could just sense the optimism for the upcoming season from them as well as the players as they prepared getting ready for practice. Indeed, it is a very good sign to have the legion of walking wounded from last year's squad; i.e., junior point guard Gabby Zehrer and senior forward Mary Neumann, healthy again. I was also impressed by sophomore forward Mari Lee as she looks very strong and very confident from an offseason of hard work and preparation.
After a session of warm-up exercises that included defensive slides/jogs and zig zag defensive slides/sprints and a myriad of dynamic stretching exercises, Pinkerton has the team perform a drill called "star passing" whereby players are lined up at five different locations on the half-court and the players have to sharply and crisply make long passes and complete lay-ups at the end. Pinkerton also has the squad perform two more lay-up drills as well - one drill called "Canton Lay-ups" and another one called "2-Line Layups"; the latter being where players are lined up on either side of the basket and one player makes a shot off the glass and then caroms the ball off the other side of the glass for a player on the other side to grab the ball and tip it in for an easy shot.
The next important drill the team does is called "Villanova Closeouts" which entails work on ball screen with a contact switch. Next is a short combo drill with two groups where they work on two "v-cuts in deny". Pinkerton: "We're trying to establish a different defensive philosophy here at St. Kate's." Indeed, the intensity on this one is noticeable as Kjar; who is handling one of the groups is shouting "Deny, Deny!!!"
After a full-court shooting drill and some half-court 5-on-5 work, there is an interesting drill that starts out as a 3-on-2 situation in transition but has two defensive "trailers" coming in to assist. After the squad splits into two groups to do some 3-on-3 work conducted by Kjar and Peper, the squad then does a 5-0 "shell" drill conducted by Peper to work on offensive movement and setting screens. After a group of five players complete a set, they then go the other way in transition to complete the drill.
Next on the agenda is a drill entitled "Rolling Ball Closeouts Into 1-On-1". Basically, the way this works is that the offensive player starts from near the baseline area and rolls the ball out to the "high" area and has to recover to that area to get it. The defensive player meanwhile starts out in the "high" area but goes down low and then has to recover back out to the "high" area again to meet the offensive player where they then battle it out. After that there is a 4-on-4 defensive combo drill that once again emphasizes the new defensive philosophy that Pinkerton wants to establish. Kjar; who is handling one of the groups has the intensity flowing again as he shouts "Full denial!!!" as the team grinds through the work in this drill. And woe to the squad that gives up the middle of the floor on defense as sprints await for them.
Lastly on this evening is full-court 5-on-5 work with the squad split into three groups (purple, yellow and gray) that lasts for approximately 15 minutes before Pinkerton has the group assemble for a short pep talk to wrap things for the night. All in all, not a bad practice. A few little "owies" during the night - a bloody nose suffered by Zehrer and a blister that momentarily slowed sophomore sensation LaShay Holt and a few other minor scratches and/or scrapes but everyone came out fine and ready to go for the next practice.
Outtakes: The St. Kate's faithful have reason to be upbeat for this upcoming season. With everyone healthy again - and if they stay relatively healthy throughout the year - they should certainly improve on last season's disappointing 4-21 record. The post spot remains a bit of concern but, as I mentioned earlier, Lee has worked hard on the offseason and is noticeably stronger and should be able to hold her own down low. Obviously, the leadership and experience of departed senior Kristen Lee will be missed but I also think that Zehrer and others are more than capable of stepping into that leadership role.......The Wildcats have an interesting early schedule as they start the season out in Boston at a tip-off tournament there and also have a home date with UW-Stout plus encounters with three different UMAC teams as well - Crown, North Central and Northwestern with two of those games at the Butler Center (North Central and Northwestern). Concordia University of Chicago also makes a trip to the Twin Cities to take on the 'Cats just before the first of the year as well so if St. Kate's can get off to a good start and enter the brutal MIAC season with a head of steam, they certainly have the capability to make an impact. One nice aspect of the revamped MIAC scheduling for St. Kate's is that they only get Concordia once (at Butler Center) and SMU once (down in Winona) but they do pick up both UST and Bethel twice. IMHO, this team is certainly capable of 12-13 wins but if things click and go "right" for them, they could definitely surprise.
No comments:
Post a Comment