On the challenges of the transfers watching and not being able to play last year: McKenzie’s really got a little bit of that junkyard dog kind of mentality and can set the tone for your defense when you want to extend it.” McKenzie’s been really scoring in a lot of different ways, and I’m hopeful that McKenzie may be, along with Aisia Robertson would be two of our better on-ball defenders. I think you’ll see us throw the ball ahead a little bit more, and they’re both really dynamic and fast with the ball and can create not only their own shot, but create for others. And then you talk about Jayde Christopher also being a point guard for us, the pace that they play with is much different than what we saw last year. Jessica is going to play some point guard, but I think we can move her off the ball a little bit too. “You know, the pace that we’ll play with will be quite a bit different. On the pace that the point guards and guards will play with: So, October and November are going to be really big months for them.” And then Lisa was only here in July and played a little bit in Europe, not a lot. We wanted to make sure she took advantage of that. She had an internship with Nike that is kind of an once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and going to benefit her long beyond her basketball career. And then in terms of the two front-line players, Sydney Umeri and Lisa Blair, it’s going to take them some time. I feel like they have a lot of experience already, even though it’s not on the court here in Allen Fieldhouse. So they spent the entire season last year working in to things, but I thought they had really good summer with the 10 practices that we had in August in preparation for the Europe trip. “Two of them were here all last year in Jessica Washington and McKenzie Calvert. On the biggest challenge in bringing in somebody that’s a transfer trying to get them into the system and to mold them into becoming players: We didn’t have a lot of other options, but I am pleased with the progress that they’ve made.” I do think that those are really valuable minutes that they gained, and they were thrown into the fire. “I think we started three freshmen and two sophomores a lot, and that’s not really a recipe for success, in particular in the Big 12. On the payoff this year of playing some of the freshmen? I know you don’t want to have three or four on the floor at a time, but sophomore year, that experience: Last year, she was a little bit of an all-or-nothing player when she got in there, whether it was dropping it off or finishing it at the rim, and I think now she understands, especially with the size in our league, the value of having a mid-range or a floater game, if you will.” She’s so dynamic off the bounce and can get the ball in the lane. “And then Jayde really didn’t have a mid-range jump shot when she arrived on campus, and that’s something that we’ve worked really, really hard with her to develop. I think there’s some situations that we can do a better job managing, hopefully now that we have a little bit more depth.” But 37, 38 minutes is a lot of minutes for anybody in the country, but especially a freshman. For a player who needs to have their legs under them and that’s really got the opportunity to be a prolific 3-point shooter, she doesn’t want to hear that we have to get her minutes down. She played way too many minutes last year. She wasn’t happy with her 3-point percentage in particular a year ago. ![]() ![]() “I would say Jayde Christopher and Kylee Kopatich. ![]() On playing a lot of freshmen last year and ones that made the most progress: It’s been said to me many times that we led the country in minutes played by freshmen last year, and it’s nice to see those young guys really develop and make some significant progress in their game.” I was really happy with a lot of things that I saw, both with team improvement, but maybe most importantly with the individual improvement that our players made, in particular our freshmen. “We’re really excited about the opportunity to build on the momentum that we’ve built this summer, especially in regards to our trip to Europe. Kansas women’s basketball head coach Brandon Schneider 4.īelow are quotes from Schneider and a few of the Jayhawks. Kansas will start practice for the 2016-17 campaign on Tuesday, Oct. The media-only event began with head coach Brandon Schneider’s preseason press conference followed by one-on-one interviews with the Jayhawks. – With the start of basketball season and Late Night in the Phog fresh on everyone’s minds, Kansas women’s basketball opened its doors to members of the media for KU’s annual media day on Monday, Oct.
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