Just two weeks after arthroscopic knee surgery, freshman point guard
Taren OBrien has returned to the Illinois State basketball team. That fact plus the recent performances of other players presents a challenge to Redbird head coach
Jenny Yopp and her staff as they approach a Thursday game at Evansville.
Its a challenge, said Yopp, whose 3-13 Redbirds are trying to get their first half and early second half play to match the late-game efforts.
At Indiana State, Yopp started
Steph Reichle at the point, with veterans
Kellie Johnson and
Shandeen Hunt on the wings. Johnsons 11 points at Indiana State were her season best. Like she has in other seasons, Hunt has found her mid-season shooting touch. She has averaged 14.5 points in her last two games.
Shandeen is a stabilizer, said Yopp. She is shooting with confidence and consistency. Kellie can give us experience and strength on the court.
But other perimeter players have looked good lately, too. Yopp called freshman
Stacey White our most improved player right now.
Jaci McCormack, Illinois States No. 2 scorer, came off the bench at Indiana State to score a team-high 17 points.
The factor with Stacey White is getting her into the game sooner, said Yopp. She has become an earlier option. Jaci is shooting the three right now. What she does on the court is no surprise to anyone. Lately, she has been shooting the three very consistently and scoring for us in spurts.
The return of OBrien, who leads the Redbirds in steals, gives Yopp two full platoons of players at the 1, 2 and 3 positions. Its a pleasant problem for Yopp, who, a year ago, frequently started games with as few as six healthy players--total.
Were trying to become a more consistent basketball team, start to finish, said Yopp, whose team has finished much better than it has started lately. In seven conference games, Illinois State has been out-scored by an average of 15.4 points per game in the first 32 minutes of games. The last eight minutes are a different story.
The Birds have out-pointed six of those seven opponents in roughly the final eight minutes, out-scoring them by an average of 19.4 points per game to 15.1 points per game. Against Indiana State, the Birds scored 25 points in the final eight minutes--just 42 in the first 32 minutes. Similarly, ISU had just 34 points in the first 32 minutes at Wichita State, then scored 24 points in the final eight.
While the strong finishes please Yopp, she wants more consistency because she believes consistency will produce victories.
Its not going to take big plays, said Yopp. Its going to take absolute maximum effort and consistency, not just playing out of emotion. We have improved in that area, but it has been taking us 30 minutes to realize we can compete with the team were playing.
Evansville, the nations No. 14 three-point shooting teams, has rebuilt its post play around junior Lisa Eckart following the early-season injury to all-America candidate Shyla McKibbon. First-year Aces coach Tricia Cullop, a former star player at Purdue, appreciates Eckarts efforts.
She has taken up the slack on the boards and also stepped up her scoring, said Cullop. (Losing McKibbon) could have been tougher for us, but other players have stepped up.
Eckarts 15.3 points and 6.9 rebounds per game include 20 of 60 from three-point range. UEs other gunners include Tami Materson (28-93), Shinko Ono (20-58), Ali Langham (12-41) and Latasha Austin (11-31). The Aces, 8-7 overall, 4-3 in the Valley, have 102 three-pointers in 15 games.
