First a bit about Colorado’s schedule, info I didn’t have for their preview story. Colorado plays the Oregon schools and Cal and Stanford once. They do play Final two team Louisville but other than that not real challenging. The Buffalos play New Mexico and Illinois as the toughest teams after Louisville.
Last Season, back to Utah: The Utes were 23-14 and made it to the Finals of the WNIT. The Utes were 8-10 in Pac 12 play.
Coaches:
Anthony Levrets returns for his 4th season as Head Coach after 3 seasons as an assistant at Utah.
Velaida Harris is in her 4th season as an assistant at Utah. She was Jillian Harmon’s Sr year High School coach.
Matt Legerski has been an assistant at Utah since 2003. His uncle is the Women’s Coach at Wyoming.
Willette White is in her 3rd season at Utah but has been an Assistant coach at Oregon, Washington and associate head coach at UCLA. White has 20 years as a Pac 10/12 assistant and received her Master’s degree from Ohio State the same year Amy Tucker received hers.
Losses:
Iwalani Rodriques and Rachel Messer were the starting guards for Utah and have graduated. Rodriques averaged 11 points per game and Messer 4. But Messer made 37 threes at 44% ( and made on 9 two pointers for the season), and Rodriques made 43 threes at 34%. Rodriques also led the team in assists and was 3rd in rebounding.
Chelsea Bridgewater averaged 1 point and 9 minutes per game.
Additions:
Wendy Anae is a 6-3 Frosh unranked forward from San Diego. She is a cousin to the Nawahine sisters.
Malia Nawahine is 5-10 frosh wing from Utah who like her sister and cousin grew up in California. Malia is unranked but scored 18 points per game last season in HS and shot 40% from three.
Valarie Nawahine is a 5-9 soph guard who transferred from BYU. I believe she sat out this past season so can play this year.
Devri Owens is a 5-8 frosh guard from Texas. Like the others above, she was not ranked out of HS.
Emily Potter is a 6-5 post from Canada with starting experience for the Canadian 17U and 19U teams. She was the 3rd leading scorer for the 19U team in the World Championships this past summer.
Schedule: The Utes play the Oregon schools and Cal and Stanford once. Nebraska and BYU are their toughest non-conference teams. They also play Utah State and UCSB.
Team:
Utah has two of the Pac 12’s best players but many unknowns after 6-3 Post Taryn Wicijowki, and Michelle Plouffe a 6-4 Sr Forward. Both women are Canadians and both are Srs. Plouffe averaged 17 points and 9 rebounds per game last season. Plus she hit 58 threes at 35% and led the team in steals, more than twice the next player. Plouffe has 1,566 career points and 865 career rebounds, huge totals going into her Sr season. Plouffe had sisters play at Washington and Marquette.
Wicijowski averaged 14 points and 7 rebounds per game. Taryn has 1,455 career points and 774 career rebounds.
Danielle Rodruquez started all but one game last season averaging 3 points and 3 rebounds. Rodriquez is a 5-10 soph guard.
Paige Crozon is a 6-1 soph wing who is also Canadian. Paige started 10 games last season averaging 4 points and 2 rebounds. Like all Utah returnees Paige can make threes.
Cheyenne Wilson is a 5-11 Jr guard who averaged 4 points per game.
The returning players who will provide support include Nakia Arquette a 6-1 redshirt frosh forward who hurt her knee in the 4th game last season. Ciera Dunbar is a 5-10 redshirt Jr guard with 3 knee injuries but did play in all the games last season averaging one point per game. Awa Kalmstrom is a 5-7 soph guard who just played a few minutes and the same for 6-2 Sr forward Ariel Reynolds.
There is certainly room for the frosh to play especially Potter although it’s not a highly rated class at all.
Prediction: Two very good post players and the frosh Potter should help up front. But the Guard/Wing play is pretty much unknown. If several guards and or wings step up it’s a solid team. If not then Utah falls to the 2nd division.
2014 Recruiting:
Joesetti Fatuesi, 6-2 Post, # 123, Tanaeye Boclair, 6-0, 3 star.
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