Since the arrival of head coach Kelly Graves in 2014, Oregon women’s basketball has moved up one place in each season’s Pac-12 preseason coaches’ poll.
This year, the Ducks were picked to finish seventh.
A big factor in Oregon’s seventh place spot on the poll is due to the inexperience in the team. With seven freshmen, and a lot of questions surrounding who the Ducks will feature most, the unpredictability of Oregon can be used as a weapon.
“I think we have the ability to finish higher. It makes sense. You lose arguably the greatest player in program history (Jillian Alleyne) and you lose five other seniors,” Graves said, now entering his third season. “I thought it was pretty good where we were picked and we can use it as motivation.
“In the end, you play everybody. We play most of them twice. It works itself out and I like to think we can finish a lot higher.”
The Ducks will lack experience in prior collegiate basketball minutes with seven freshmen and the loss of a consistent post presence, but Oregon signed the No. 3 recruiting class in the nation, according to espnW.
“We’re a lot younger, but a lot more athletic,” senior forward Jacinta Vandenberg said. “We have more posts who are athletic…and that helps a lot with our defense protecting the key and then also helping on drives.”
Being picked seventh place will still loom over the freshmen, who are used to being elite players on top teams during their high school careers. In nonconference, the team will gain momentum with wins, and it will be important that the team quickly gels to avoid falling behind when Pac-12 play rolls around.
“We have a really deep team, in that we can have a lot of variations,” freshman forward Lydia Giomi said. “We have a lot of guards that can do different things and a lot of posts that can do different things, and mixing and matching with that is going to be hard to predict us on the court.”
Graves said he anticipates having many freshmen contribute critical minutes early on. Performing well as a team is crucial to the Ducks for a successful season.
“It’s an honor and it’s really exciting.” Giomi said. “Once you get on the court, everybody’s average. The playing court is even. Now it’s up to us to fulfill that expectation.”
Though the seventh-place pick in the preseason coaches’ poll does not impact what plays out on the court, the Ducks will still look to exceed those expectations. For some, the pick is nothing but a number.
“Being named seventh doesn’t really mean a lot to us,” Vandenberg said. “We have a lot to prove; we have a really good recruiting class. It will be good to get out there and just show what we can do.”
Follow Shawn Medow on Twitter @ShawnMedow