The state of Women’s Basketball

by Aren Dow, Alestle Managing Editor

Maybe it’s not looking so bad after all.

After starting out 2-15 for the season, the SIUE women’s squad has come out with victory in three of their last five games, including their lone win on the road. The Cougars most recently bested future Ohio Valley Conference foe UT Martin, bringing their imaginary conference record to 2-1.

I unfortunately missed the game because of a little thing called class, but caught a few highlights on Channel 10 to see the Cougars in action. They looked the same as they have all year – resilient and determined. No matter what kind of funk this team gets into, they never give up. Whatever Coach Amanda Levens is selling to her players, it’s working. And recently, it’s producing wins.

Here’s a list of the deficits they’ve closed (or almost closed) in the second half this season

• Valparaiso – down 19, closed to within six (1:11 left)
• Wichita State – down 21, closed to within five (0:34 left)
• Northern Kentucky – down 7, won by three
• Eastern Kentucky – down 21, closed to within three (0:57 left)
• UT Martin – down 8, won by three

The two words encompassing the resiliency of the Cougars – Ashley Bey. She will take the game into her hands when she needs to, whether to sacrifice her body to draw a foul, up her outstanding defense and/or find the open shooter. You can tell the team feeds off her energy as well. Ashley doesn’t seem like a strong vocal leader, but her play does enough to rally the rest of the team around her.

Bey only has a few games left as a Cougar, but she is making every one count. Her stat line in the UT Martin is plain ridiculous – eight points, nine rebounds, seven steals and six assists. When UT Martin crept to a three point lead with five minutes left, it was Bey who had two consecutive steals and assists to permanently give SIUE the lead.

The team’s recent success, I think, it mainly due to the team improving as a whole. Besides Bey, Sydney Stahlberg and Whitney Champlin, every other player is a freshman or sophomore. Besides Bey, Melia Duncan, Madison Meade and Kate Affourtit, everyone on the team was brand new playing for SIUE.

In the first few games of the season, SIUE ran the high-low from Bey to Raven Berry seemingly every other play. It was for good reason, that was how they scored much of their points. This team has evolved since then, Duncan has a killer three-pointer when she finds her shot and Michaela Herrod is a valuable post presence.

Tangent on Duncan – Levens talked after the South Dakota game about how Duncan doesn’t know how good she really is. Which you can see. Melia will put up 20 and say afterwards, “I guess I had a good game.” She is very humble about her game. She’ll make the extra pass sometimes, even if she is open. The game against South Dakota showed her potential – 7-10 shooting and 3-4 behind the arc (the lone three-pointer was a last-ditch shot as the shot clock ran out). The ceiling is awfully high…

Of course, it doesn’t hurt SIUE to play teams similar to them either. Winning on the road against Wisconsin, Northwestern and Wichita State just isn’t realistic, playing teams in OVC gives a better gauge of where this team is.

Right now, it doesn’t look too bad.

They’ve lost some close games and gave up a few leads, but as I said before they can pull the same trick. All three of their games against OVC schools have been extremely close – all have been decided by five points or less. Is it any coincidence all three games were won by the home team? Probably not.

Where we are, I like seeing that.

I get a sense, even though we are in our transitional phase, we aren’t playing like it. SIUE is competing at a level where we can compete with any other school in the conference. They’ve beat four D-I teams, which is already three more than last year. That’s all you can ask for from this team. In time, the Wisconsin’s and Northwestern’s will become more of a match-up.

The rest of the schedule (besides Miami (FL) and the Robert Morris exhibition), is a great schedule for the Cougars to end with some noise. Every school is either in the OVC next year or an independent school like we are at the moment.

To win three or four more games would be absolutely fantastic. We have the toughest OVC team at home in Eastern Illinois, all other OVC schools are on the road. The Cougars have come within five points to winning a D-I game on the road this season, and to win one or two would show the progress made this year.

The two-hour drive to Southeast Missouri State (their next game – Tuesday at 5:30) is actually the shortest drive to any other school in the OVC. (I think Eastern Illinois loses by 11 miles or so). Make the trip if you can, and cheer on the young, talented team. You won’t be disappointed.