BATON ROUGE — The LSU Lady Tiger basketball team officially kicked off the start of the 2001-02 season with a two-hour practice on Saturday afternoon in the Pete Maravich Assembly Center.
“For our first practice of the season, I was really pleased with what we accomplished today,” said head coach Sue Gunter, entering her 20th season at the helm of the Lady Tiger program. “We got through everything we wanted to do and had no surprises. The kids we thought would step up for us, like Kisha James, Ke-Ke Tardy, Aiysha Smith and Scholanda Dorrell, really showed that they are ready to step up for us.”
Among the new faces on the court for the Lady Tigers were Smith, a Kodak Junior College All-American transfer, transfer Patty Hanten and freshmen Dorrell and Tillie Willis.
LSU returns five players from last season’s team that advanced to the second round of the NCAA Tournament. The returning players include the lone Lady Tiger senior, All-American candidate DeTrina White, juniors James and Tardy and sophomores Doneeka and Roneeka Hodges.
Freshman Wendlyn Jones, a Blytheville (Ark.) HS product, did not participate in practice on Saturday after being treated for a minor medical problem at home in Arkansas on Friday. She is expected to return for conditioning drills on Monday and start full contact practice later in the week.
Also not participating in practice for the Lady Tigers were White, freshman Florence Williams and sophomore Temeka Johnson. White is still trying to return to full speed after back problems sidelined her for several games last season. It should be 2-3 more weeks before she is able to begin practice.
After sitting out last season, Johnson will not be eligible until the end of the fall semester. Williams, a Miami-Edison HS product, is an NCAA partial qualifier and will be unable to play for the Lady Tigers this season. Although she is allowed to practice with the team, she did not participate in the opening practice.
“One of the things we need to work on right now is getting more players on the court,” said Gunter. “We need to get those injured players healthy again. DeTrina is making good progress and should return in a couple of weeks and Wendlyn should return later on next week.”
After participating in four-player drills earlier this fall under the direction of assistant coach Bob Starkey, the team focused mainly on defense and rebounding in the first full-squad workout.
“Coach Starkey really utilizes our four-player workouts to teach our offense,” said Gunter, “so our main focus today was to introduce our defense and work on our rebounding. We have to get better at our on-the-ball defense and rebounding if we are going to be successful this season.”
The Lady Tigers open the 2001-02 season hosting the Jackson All-Stars in an exhibition game on Wed, Nov. 7 at 7 p.m.