New days, new opponents and new strategies.
The ASU women’s basketball team is preparing to face Oregon State (10–5, 1–3 Pac-12) and Oregon (9–7, 1–3 Pac-12) on the road by practicing new and different strategies to win.
The Sun Devils (10-4, 1-2 Pac-12) struggled offensively against the zone defense in their last two games. In practice last week, the team spent a lot of time working to break the zone offensively.
Senior guard Olivia Major said the team worked out a new scheme to combat the zone and is excited to unleash it.
“We actually came up with a new offense, and it has been working in practice. It’s time to execute it in a game,” Major said. “When the time comes, I think it is going to be something good for us.”
The Sun Devils are looking to Olivia “O” Major for some new offense.
She battled a knee injury early in the preseason that kept her off the court. Lately, she has seen more minutes on the floor.
Coach Joseph Anders hopes that Major’s 3-point shooting abilities can help spark the Sun Devils’ offense. Her outside shooting can also do wonders to break the zone.
Major said she enjoys getting the extra minutes, but starting is not important.
“It doesn’t matter to me (who is) starting,” she said. “I don’t want to lose. I don’t care who you start. I know I want to help this team win, but that doesn’t matter to me. That’s the last thing on my mind.”
Oregon State and Oregon offer some defensive challenges for the Sun Devils defensively.
As a team, OSU shoots 44 percent from the floor. The Beavers also have three scorers in senior guard Earlysia Marchbanks, freshman guard Ali Gibson and junior forward Patricia Bright. All three average over 10 points per game.
The Beavers’ season has been impressive so far. The team faced a tough coaching change and lost a lot of key players over the past two years.
OSU came into Pac-12 play with only two losses and have hung tough with Pac-12 competition, losing to Washington State in overtime and only losing by seven to No. 4 Stanford.
Anders said he has respect for the OSU coaching staff for turning things around.
“Any time you take over something where you’ve lost as many kids and coaches over the time they went through that bad spot (and) regain the trust and confidence of the team, that’s a masterful job,” Anders said.
Oregon has struggled this season, but Anders said they will fight to protect their home court.
One player, senior forward Amanda Johnson, leads the Ducks offensively. She averages 20 points per game.
The Sun Devils worked on their defense to combat Oregon’s top scorer.
“We just have to shut her down, probably put our best defender on her and switch off,” freshman forward Jada Blackwell said. “When she gets tired, (we will) put another defender on her to wear her out.”
The Sun Devils worked on some new plans to try and beat the Oregon schools on the road. The goal is for these new offensive strategies to spark a new win streak.
Reach the reporter at ehubbard@asu.edu
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