NOVEMBER 12, 2009 ISSUE
ASU Women’s Basketball
Young Mountaineers to Help Women’s Team
Sophomore Canesha Edwards was named to the Southern Conference’s all-freshman team after she averaged 6.6 points and 7.5 rebounds last season. 
Guard Sam Ramirez averaged 10.6 points per game last season and will be one of the top scorers for the team this season. She also averaged 4.4 assists per game.
Head Coach Darcie VincentThere is a youth movement happening on the ASU women’s basketball team.
Only two upperclassmen are on the roster this season and the five sophomores and five freshmen will be looked upon to help the Mountaineers better last year’s nine-win season.
“We were young last year, but this year we’re a lot younger,” said guard Sam Ramirez, the lone junior on the team.
They open the season at 7:00 p.m. this Friday, November 13, at Marshall, a team that beat ASU by two points in last season’s opener.
Ramirez will be in charge of the on-court leadership, as senior center Karina Mill suffered a season-ending knee injury over the summer and will miss the season.
There isn’t a fear with having so many young players on a team, though.
“It’s a really good thing when you take over a program,” second-year coach Darcie Vincent said. “In four or five years from now you don’t want to be in that boat or you aren’t doing something right in your recruiting process.
“When you’ve taken over a program and trying to revamp it basically to get it back to where it once was, it’s nice because you can raise them right.”
The hope is that Vincent and her staff—which includes three new coaches to the team—can mold the young players who will in turn mold new arrivals in the next few years.
Vincent will teach her way and how she wants things done.
Still, the team will be as good as the young talent plays. Vincent said that the 10 underclassmen have plenty of talent.
“They know they have to play like junior and seniors,” she said. “We told them that our worst fear as a team right now is we don’t want to be in January and hearing people say, ‘Wow, they’re going to be really good in a year or two.’”
Last year, guards Canesha Edwards and Sade Means were named to the Southern Conference’s all-freshmen team. Other current sophomores—guard Chakeitha Weldon and forwards Catherine Williamson and Haley Hackett—also saw action.
“Everyone is looking at us as the underdog, but we’re a really talented team and we’re going to shock some people,” Edwards said.
The five freshmen have plenty of talent and fight for playing time with other players.
Game film of the Mountaineers’ first few games will be a hot commodity to other Southern Conference coaches.
“There are six or seven players on the team that no one knows who they are,” Vincent said.
Those films will show a defensive-minded team that works hard to force turnovers. The hope is for 20-plus points off turnovers each game.
“Once we get the turnover, we’re looking to push the ball up the floor,” Edwards said. “Our defense is so hectic—we’re always moving, we’re all over the place, we’re scrappy.”
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