|
Post by skrapheap on May 6, 2015 13:00:38 GMT -6
|
|
|
Post by skrapheap on May 11, 2015 14:46:11 GMT -6
Northern Kentucky University is the tenth school in the Horizon League as of July 1st.
From a check of last season's media guide and the 2014-15 schedule, it appears that the Panthers have not played NKU previously, so the two games to be added to the schedule for this season will be the Panthers' first against them.
The league has appeared to improve in the last few seasons. Last season, in additional to Green Bay getting an automatic bid to the NCAA, three league teams accepted bids to the Women's NIT. And UIC won the WBI tournament in 2014. No team has emerged as a consistent challenger to Green Bay's dominance in Women's Basketball, but Cleveland State and Wright State have put together rosters that have been credible challengers the last two years, and the Raiders won the 2014 tournament in Green Bay. The Phoenix will remain the team to beat for some time to come, but i hope NKU's program will help increase the level of play in the league, which should help insure more post-season bids.
|
|
|
Post by Pounce Needs Pals on Sept 23, 2015 9:12:59 GMT -6
|
|
|
Post by PantherU on Sept 29, 2015 8:49:36 GMT -6
Is this a make-or-break year for Kyle?
Sent from my SCH-R970 using proboards
|
|
|
Post by skrapheap on Sept 29, 2015 13:38:10 GMT -6
Good question.
This is Coach Rechliz's fourth season on the job, and the first with a roster entirely of players she and her staff have recruited.
She has spoken repeatedly about "changing the culture" of the program. Presumably she has done so, since all the players were recruited by her and her staff, and were chosen because they fit the culture she is trying to build. The Athletics Department has been willing to keep her on as she has undertaken to build that culture.
The results from her first three teams have been steady: nine, eight, and ten wins overall. A combination of injuries to key players, and other losses (transfers out, and a departure "to focus on academics") has meant that her teams have played from short rosters at times during those three years.
The returning core is decent: Jenny Lindner and Steph Kostowicz, both sophomores, are solid players. Lindner made the league all-Freshman team last season. Kostowicz, once she recovered from an injury that kept her out for the initial third of the season, was productive, helping to take the load off Lindner and Ashley Green. Senior leadership will come from Jordyn Swan, who has been productive but has lost a lot of time to injury (last year was the first time she was available all season, and she was a reliable scorer and rebounder), and Sydney Howard, who has improved steadily over her first three seasons; last year she showed signs of becoming a better scorer.
The rest of the squad is young: three juniors, one sophomore, and five freshman. Two of the juniors are new: Alexis Lindstrom (transferred from Northern Illinois University last fall and sat out; a good three-point shooter) and Sierra Ford-Washington (a transfer from a succesful junior college program). The sophomore, Kelsey Cunningham, is a defensive specialist who played a lot last year. One of the freshman, Alba Izquierdo, is from Spain, so her transition from the international game should be interesting to watch. (This fall, a player, Bailey Farley, transferred from Loyola, but she will sit out 2015-16 under NCAA rules.)
Amanda Braun has been content to let Coach Rechliz build the program her way for the last three years. I imagine the AD would like to see the program take a step forward. How big the step will have to be, i can't guess, but finishing higher than the bottom third of the league would be a realistic target IMO; accomplishing that would make it less likely that the Panthers would meet Green Bay early in the league tournament. Beating Green Bay at least once would be a big step forward.
|
|
|
Post by PantherU on Sept 29, 2015 18:51:32 GMT -6
I hate to put a bottom bar on the program; I don't watch a lot of the games and I haven't physically been to a women's game in years.
That said, I'd like to see marked improvement. 13-14 wins shouldn't be too much to ask for.
|
|
|
Post by skrapheap on Oct 1, 2015 11:09:14 GMT -6
I hate to put a bottom bar on the program; I don't watch a lot of the games and I haven't physically been to a women's game in years. That said, I'd like to see marked improvement. 13-14 wins shouldn't be too much to ask for. Given that the team's non-league schedule is usually pretty tough, the bulk of those additional wins would be more likely to come in league play. That would have the effect i mentioned: raising the Panthers in the HL standings and making it less likely that the Panthers would have to face Green Bay early in the league tournament.
|
|
|
Post by skrapheap on Nov 12, 2015 12:06:51 GMT -6
Coach Rechliz tweeted that she expected two of the three verbal commits for 2016-17 to sign on the first day of the early signing period. Milwaukee Women's Basketball tweeted welcomes to two players: Jaye Dawn Two Bears, from Standing Rock, ND, and Lizzie Odegard, from Minnetonka, MN. Two Bears is a guard/forward (5'10" tall). Here's some video of her, taken from her sophomore year: www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ezG0dV_o0Q Appears to a lot of things fairly well. Odegard is a forward (6'0" tall).
|
|
|
Post by panthermadness34 on Nov 13, 2015 12:41:16 GMT -6
Jaye Two Bears is Ranked 178 player in the class of 2016 .. Probably the best Recruit Milwaukee has gotten in a long time.. Milwaukee Womens Basketball is gonna look good moving forward with the last two classes Coach Rechs has signed..
|
|
|
Post by skrapheap on Nov 16, 2015 17:39:49 GMT -6
Jaye Two Bears is Ranked 178 player in the class of 2016 .. Probably the best Recruit Milwaukee has gotten in a long time.. Milwaukee Womens Basketball is gonna look good moving forward with the last two classes Coach Rechs has signed.. mkepanthers.com/news/2015/11/16/WBB_1116150013.aspxThe Panthers added a third player in the early signing period. Also, in the pre-game notes for tonights season opener, it is mentioned that Jordyn Swan will miss the entire season due to an injury suffered in practice. That's too bad for her. The Panthers opponent tonight is the University of Missouri, Kansas City, who finished last season 6-24.
|
|
|
Post by MKEPanthers45 on Nov 17, 2015 1:11:49 GMT -6
The Women looked pretty solid against UMKC tonight.
|
|
|
Post by skrapheap on Nov 17, 2015 15:51:12 GMT -6
I agree. It still looked very much like the first game of the season, but they played very well in spots, and led from wire to wire.
Jenny Lindner and Steph Kostowicz played well. Sierra Ford-Washington looks like the real deal at point guard. Once Alexis Lindstrom got going, she contributed significantly.
I'm intrigued by Alba Izquierdo. She handles the ball and passes pretty well...a little too well in spots. She was trying to make really good passes that didn't quite work. Once she adjusts to a set of new teammates, some of those errant passes should find shooters with open looks.
The Panthers are off unil next Tuesday night, when they begin a three-game swing through Florida. They play Florida Atlantic on Tuesday, and then play in a tournament at the University of Miami on Friday and Saturday. The Panthers next home game is December 3rd, against Northern Illinois.
|
|
|
Post by skrapheap on Dec 10, 2015 19:49:47 GMT -6
The Panthers faced the Eastern Illinois Panthers on Thursday night. EIU came in with a 1-7 record, having won their first game and lost the next seven. They had forced a couple of overtime games in that streak. Milwaukee was coming off their worst single game shooting percentage in program history, having lost to an unbeaten and 15th ranked Northwestern University by 25 points, to even the Panthers's season record to 3-3.
The game started slowly, with EIU taking a 9-4 lead. The Panthers then went on a 8-1 run to take a 17-10 lead. EIU closed to 25-23, after which Milwaukee scored 10 more consecutive points to open a 35-23 lead. After Eastern closed to seven at 35-28, the Panthers went on another run, to open a 15 point(47-32) halftime lead. Milwaukee shot almost 60% from the floor, hitting 7-14 three-point shots. The Panthers were lead in scoring by Sierra Ford-Washington, who established a career high in a Milwaukee uniform by scoring 17 points in the first half. She appears to provide the Panthers with a third scoring option after Jenny Lindner and Steph Kostowicz. Lindner had nine points and Kostowicz had six at halftime.
As they had earlier in the game, Eastern Illinois chipped away at the lead in the third quarter, taking advantage of Milwaukee foul trouble (giving them a huge advantage in free throw attempts) to narrow the lead to eight (53-45) at the media timeout getting all the way back to down one point (54-53) with less than a minute left in the third quarter. Milwaukee finally answered with a bucket from Alyssa Fischer and free throws from Lindner and Ford-Washington to close out the quarter, leading 60-53.
Milwaukee continued its run, scoring six of the first seven points of the fourth quarter to reopen a 12 point lead. Lindner had back to back two-pointers on her way to 15 points early in the quarter. Lindner then hit a three-pointer to answer EIU's first basket of the quarter and reopen a 13 point lead heading into a Milwaukee timeout. The Panthers crowned the rally with three free throws from Lindner to reach 21 points for the game (tying Ford-Washington). Eastern Illinois put together another mini-run to narrow the lead to 74-67, Milwaukee, with less than three minutes in the game. Milwaukee pushed the lead back to 12 at 79-67. EIU was forced to foul, and Milwaukee made free throws to win the game 82-71. Lindner and Ford-Washington lead Milwaukee with 25 points each (Lindner's second 25 point output for the season), followed by Alyssa Fischer with 10, and Kostowicz and Alexis Lindstrom with nine points each. Milwaukee finished the game shooting 47.5% overall, 8-22 from long range.
|
|
|
Post by icelandreliant on Dec 14, 2015 22:52:08 GMT -6
I went to the women's game against Denver tonight. It was actually a birthday present for me from my wife. I'm weird that way. (My other choice was an Admirals game tomorrow night) Took our two young kids. The Panthers played very poorly against a Denver team with only eight players dressed, coming in with one win on the season. Milwaukee kept it close and managed to cut Denver's lead to two with about a minute left, but we just could not shoot the whole game. We finished with 25% shooting, just terrible.
It is encouraging to see some of these posts about other games earlier in the year where the women looked good. Tonight they looked too short, not physical enough, and like they couldn't make a basket to save their life.
I have enjoyed following the Panther women over the last four years since moving to Milwaukee. They seem like a very positive coaching staff who does things the right way, but they have really struggled to recruit much talent.
On the other hand, we had lots of fun tonight. Saw Matt Tiby at the game. Pounce came up in the stands and got a picture with our kids. My daughter caught a mini frisbee. And thanks to our toy donation and someone handing us two tickets on the way in, our family of four got into the game for the grand total of ONE DOLLAR. Yes, ten dimes. I almost felt bad and purchased some concessions on the way out.
|
|
|
Post by skrapheap on Dec 15, 2015 6:19:17 GMT -6
So far this season, the Panthers's weakness seems to be a tendancy to go cold offensively. They had a bad third quarter in their previous game and almost gave up a fifteen point lead. Last night nobody was hitting shots and they lost. Consistency is the goal, and they need a lot of work to get there still.
|
|