The ACU women’s basketball season commences this Saturday, Nov. 10 at 7 p.m. on their home court at Moody Coliseum. They will face Texas A&M International and their high powered offense in a game that could turn out to be whoever can stop the other on defense may produce the victor.
“We are going to push them into a track meet and hopefully have to edge conditioning wise,” senior Kelsey Smith said. “We put major focus on our defense in practice and it is going to be one of our strengths. Again, we want to dictate what we let them do on offense, and take away as we can.”
“It all comes down to defense,” senior Emily Miller said. “Playing defense should be personal. If your girl scores on you, you should get mad. If we can each keep our girl off the boards, I think we’ll be ok.”
The Wildcats will look to run up the scoreboard and try to contain the Dustdevils on defense.
“We have a fast-paced offense and defense,” Miller said. “We’ll get back on defense and won’t let them run their transition on us which will shut down some of their offense. I am one hundred percent positive that there is not a team who is better conditioned than we are.”
Along with sharing a similarly paced offense, the Dustdevils also are welcoming in a new head coach. TAMI posted a 3-9 conference record last year, compared to a 12-14 overall record last year posted by the Wildcats, who were 7-13 in conference play. The Lady ‘Cats are determined to get off to a fast start and feel they are very prepared for the season.
“I think we are pretty confident going into the game Saturday,” junior Mackenzie Lankford said. “We just have to play our game and execute. If we execute our offense and defense, we should do great. Doing all the little things right will be a big factor.”
TAMI plays a very high energy-intense defensive game. They look to gamble for steals and push the ball in transition.
“As long as we run all of our offensive sets correct and work together to get each other open shots, we shouldn’t have a problem with their defense,” Lankford said.
The Wildcats will play again next week on Tues. Nov. 13 against The University of Texas of the Permian Basin.
