After seven months of waiting, Kelly Graves is finally ready to suit up for his first official game as head coach of the Oregon women’s basketball team.
Graves and the Ducks kickstart their 2014-2015 season on Friday.
Oregon will take on Utah State (15-16 last season) on Friday at noon at Matthew Knight Arena. Building on the success in the exhibition game, the Ducks had a full week of practice with lots of “energy” and “structure.”

“We’re starting to get it,” Graves said, who holds a 427-202 collegiate record overall. “This is something that is pretty foreign to them: trying to do things that they haven’t done before and put in a lot more structure, something they’re not really used to. By in large, I like where we are at.”

In the exhibition win over Westmont, freshman Lexi Bando, senior Amanda Delgado, junior Lexi Petersen, senior Katelyn Loper and junior Jillian Alleyne started for the Ducks. Bando played a team-high 25 minutes, but expect Graves’ starting five to pick up more minutes once the season officially starts.

“I think the team has really shown a lot of effort in the last couple of practices,” Alleyne, who was named to the Preseason All-Pac-12 team by the media, said. “It’s really going to show what kind of team we are on Friday.”

Utah State averaged 77.3 points per game last year, which was enough for 28th in the NCAA. However, the Aggies are without last year’s leading scorer Jennifer Schlott (26.2 ppg), who graduated after last season. She held the mark for third in the NCAA in scoring.

The game will be a homecoming for Utah State’s senior guard Elise Nelson, who is a native of Springfield, Oregon, and graduated from Thurston High. 

Junior Chloe Stiles, a Eugene native and Sheldon High grad, has played with Nelson, but hasn’t seen her since their high school days.

“The first time I played with her is when we did a team camp, her high school and my high school,” Stiles said. “I remember that she can get to the rack. She’s really aggressive.”

Stiles said the Eugene and Springfield basketball community remains connected throughout the country.

“She’ll know,” Stiles said. “She’ll know of me and Lexi (Bando) for sure, so it’ll be cool to have her here.”

Utah State returns 10 letterwinners from last year’s team, including four experienced starters in Nelson, senior forward Franny Vaaulu, junior guard/forward Stephanie Bairstow and junior guard Makenlee Williams. 

The Ducks, still transitioning from former coach Paul Westhead’s “system,” is focusing on slowing down the pace and keeping the emphasis on defense.

“To make that adjustment (slowing down), I think it comes from every person individually,” Alleyne said. “We are so quick to do everything. We want to do everything so fast, because that’s been embedded in us…It’s okay to not go a million miles per hour. We can slow it down and run time off the clock.”

This season, the Ducks were picked ninth by both the Pac-12 coaches and media polls.

“I want our team to be that team that is a force to be reckoned with,” Alleyne said. “When people come into this gym, they’re like ‘Okay, we’re playing Oregon. We actually have to play defense and offense. This team can win.’”

Graves said that he likes the attitudes of his players and their openness to change, especially on the defensive front.

“It’s going to be a work in progress all year,” Graves said. “I keep saying that. I think by the end of the year we are going to be a far better team. Every team can say that, but I think our learning curve is even greater than most.”

Follow Jonathan Hawthorne on Twitter @Jon_Hawthorne