Recap The Court

Jacob Smith

The biggest question I had about the Western Mustangs women’s basketball team through the offseason was who was going to run the offence at the point guard spot. They’ve lost Ariane Saumure to Ottawa and now as we’ve found with the release of their roster, they’ve lost Madalyn Picton who has transferred to the University of Saskatchewan.

Along with Madalyn and Ariane, Brett Fischer and Melanie Cloutier are no longer on the roster, Brett at Lambton College and Melanie at Laurentian University. Regaining some of the height, Western brought on transfer MacKeely Shantz from Guelph. At the guard spot, preseason answered some questions but also left some to be desired, starting with how MacKeely will be used in their offence with Emily Capretta running the point.

The Mustangs offence often involves the centre screening for the guard with the shooting guard and small forward in each corner and the four playing inside the paint pulling a defender away from one corner opening the drive and kick for a three or the power forward lifting out of the paint for a lane to the rim.

What we saw from MacKeely at Guelph was a strong rebounder and catch-and-go guard who usually played at the top of the three or in the high post. In Western’s system which likes to have two inside the paint to relieve pressure off shooters, putting MacKeely in the post as the four with Morgan Tamminga as the five would help with Western’s depth inside the paint. It would also take away some assets of her game that could flourish with her as a three who plays primarily outside but can be used defensively switching onto the four and rebounding.

Helping inside the paint the Mustangs also have 6’0 third year forward Jordynn Bryan who played 20 games last season averaging seven minutes per game. Jordynn rounds out a trio of Western forwards who bring a vast level of experience, and makes MacKeely’s usage that much more intriguing.

In Western’s games at Toronto Met University, we saw the shooting of Ashley Truesdale as the 2 guard for the Mustangs. In a possible bench lineup of Ashley, Avarie Thomas and rookie Paris Alexander, the Mustangs have a lot of offensive possibilities going down the lineup if they can execute efficiently.

The Mustangs had 21, 23 and 28 turnovers in their three games at the Darcel Wright Memorial Classic, and taking care of the basketball especially with the defence they’ll be going against with the Guelph Gryphons and Windsor Lancers just in their own division, will be extremely important to not put too much pressure on their own defence.