University of Southern Indiana Women’s Basketball begins the 2016-17 season Sunday at 1 p.m. (CST) when it visits NCAA Division I foe Butler University for an exhibition bout.
Sunday’s game marks the fifth straight season that the Screaming Eagles have opened the year with an exhibition against a Division I opponent. It will be aired on WSWI 95.7 FM, while live audio can be accessed at GoUSIEagles.com.
Senior forward Hannah Wascher (Rantoul, Illinois) and senior guard Tanner Marcum (New Albany, Indiana) collected All-GLVC honors in 2015-16. Wascher was named second-team All-GLVC after averaging 12.9 points and 7.6 rebounds a year ago; while Marcum was named to the third team after averaging 12.0 points, 3.0 rebounds, and 3.3 assists during her junior year.
The Eagles finished 2015-16 with a 14-13 overall record and a 7-11 mark in Great Lakes Valley Conference play. USI finished in a tie for fourth in the GLVC East Division before suffering a 71-59 setback to Saint Joseph’s College in the first round of the GLVC Tournament.
Butler is coming off a 91-39 exhibition victory over Division III Hanover College this past Sunday. The Bulldogs, who went 10-21 overall and 4-14 in Big East play a year ago, were led by Evansville native Tori Schickel’s 20 points and 15 rebounds.
Following USI’s visit to Butler, the Eagles open the regular season November 11 when they host NAIA foe Roosevelt University at the Physical Activities Center.
USI Women’s Basketball Notes
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Eagles picked fourth in GLVC East Division. USI Women’s Basketball was predicted to finish fourth in the GLVC East Division. The forecast came in the announcement of the 2016-17 GLVC Preseason Coaches’ Poll. The Screaming Eagles received 80 points, just one shy of third-place Saint Joseph’s College. Bellarmine and Lewis were picked to finish first and second, respectively, in the East Division, while Drury was the unanimous chose to win the West Division.
Eagles look to bounce back from frustrating season. USI Women’s Basketball looks to bounce back from a 2015-16 campaign that saw it post a 14-13 overall record as well as a 7-11 mark in GLVC play. After opening the year with a 10-1 overall record and a 3-0 mark in GLVC play, the Eagles suffered through a 10-game losing streak that saw them lose five games by less than 10 points and three games by fewer than five points.
What went wrong in 2015-16? USI was playing through adversity from the onset as several players missed significant time during the preseason and regular-season due to illness. Coupled with the fact that USI had overturned its roster due to the loss of seven seniors from a 25-win team in 2014-15, and that there were no seniors on last year’s roster, the Eagles, at times, had trouble stopping opponent runs that would spiral out of control during their 10-game losing streak.
What went right in 2015-16? Despite the adversity, the Eagles never quit. They showed an unwillingness to give up and kept themselves in the hunt to earn the right to host a GLVC Tournament first round home game by winning four of their final five regular-season games. USI ended the year tied for 4th in the GLVC East Division and eighth overall, but lost out on a first-round home game due to tie-breakers.
What to look forward to in 2016-17? One word: Chemistry. The Eagles return all but one player from the 2015-16 campaign, including all five starters and five seniors. USI players spent several weeks together during the summer, playing pick-up games in the PAC, and have had a strong off-season workout program that has them primed for the start of the 2016-17 campaign.
A look at USI’s lone newcomer. Freshman Morgan Sherwood, a 5-foot-10 guard/forward from Charleston High School (Illinois), is USI’s lone newcomer in 2016-17. An AAU teammate of USI juniors Kaydie Grooms and Randa Harshbarger, Sherwood was a four-time All-State honoree who averaged 22.7 points and 9.2 rebounds per game as a senior in 2016-17.
