Cal Poly Humboldt women’s basketball wrapped up their exhibition season Tuesday night with the ‘Jacks welcoming Simpson University. Humboldt picked up a 66-49 win with the new faces on the ‘Jacks roster showing plenty of promise.
Humboldt has just two returning players on the roster, senior center Jadis Watson and senior guard Marley Johnson. Watson saw playing time off of the bench while Johnson, who led the ‘Jacks in minutes last season, is working her way back from an ankle sprain and also saw time off the bench on Tuesday.
Head coach Michelle Bento-Jackson went with a starting lineup of all new ‘Jacks, senior Kaiija Lesane, sophomore Kendall Pickford, junior Dylan Lovett and junior Dailani Richardson as guards with 6’3” senior Andjela Pavicevic at the center. After a high-scoring first quarter, where the ‘Jacks outscored Simpson 21-18, the ‘Jacks locked in defensively not allowing a single field goal in the second quarter to take a 38-22 lead at the half. The Red Hawks went 0-12 from the field in the second quarter with Lesane and junior guard Moriah Burley forcing turnovers and getting out in transition to build up the ‘Jacks lead.
“One thing I like about this group is that we got depth and quality depth, not just bodies but quality depth. This is probably the deepest we’ve been in a few years,” Bento-Jackson said, after playing 11 players in the exhibition. “As we go on, maybe some people are going to separate themselves, who knows? But I like the fact we can turn and there’s not a big drop off from the starting five or the next five, there’s not a lot of drop off.”
One noticeable change from this ‘Jacks team and the one a season ago, was their three point attempts. Humboldt averaged 22 threes attempted per game last year and the ‘Jacks got 37 attempts up on Tuesday, hitting on nine of them.
“I don’t think we didn’t force a lot of them tonight,” Bento-Jackson said of the threes. “Simpson played quite a bit of zone and we were getting a lot of open looks, we didn’t knock them down at a high enough percentage but I encourage the three. I never want anyone to be gun shy, but I also want us to have some balance and understand shot selection but tonight they were open.”
The second half was closer, with Humboldt outscoring Simpson 28-27 over the final two quarters, the ‘Jacks didn’t play their sharpest, turning the ball over 19 times while racking up just 17 assists while shooting just 31% from the field in the second half. Those totals shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise, with the ‘Jacks bringing together almost a brand new team that hasn’t had time to fully build chemistry on the court.
“There’s so many new players, there’s a large learning curve, there’s a lot of teaching that I need to be doing,” Bento-Jackson said of the team. “It’s going to take some time and I got to make sure that I’m patient yet moving us forward at the same time but I’m really excited about this group.”
The ‘Jacks had only one scorer in double-figure scoring, with sophomore forward Kyori Lloyd finishing with 11 points on 4-8 shooting with five rebounds. Pickford and Lesane both finished with nine with Burley right behind them with eight points.
As a team, Humboldt forced 13 steals and blocked three shots, Pavicevic, Lesane and Richardson each had three steals in the game with Richardson adding two of the blocks as well.
“She’s not the biggest thing out there but she gets blocked shots every game.” Bento-Jackson said of Richardson, who joined the ‘Jacks from Mt. San Antonio College.
Now Humboldt will turn their attention to the regular season, which opens in Rocklin on Nov. 8 against the University of Alaska Fairbanks before facing the University of Alaska Anchorage and the ‘Jacks leading scorer from last year, Emila Long, on Nov. 9 in Rocklin after Long transferred to the Seawolves in the offseason.
Dylan McNeill can be reached at 707-441-0526.
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