Orangewomen Meet the Media
10/12/2001 5:22:47 PM | Women's Basketball
The Syracuse women's basketball team had its annual media day on Friday, Oct. 12 in Manley Field House. The Orangewomen begin preseason practice on Saturday.
Syracuse opens the 2001-02 season on Nov. 17 at Long Beach State.
Head Coach Marianna Freeman
On being an underdog this season:
"I would certainly like to be in a position where we weren't the underdog, but we have to earn that. We're willing to take on that status and try to improve on it."
On this year's schedule:
"We're traveling a little bit more than we did last season. Last year we opened up with Old Dominion and North Carolina, this we play Long Beach and Cal State-Northridge so that is a little different. This schedule is a good one. It is challenging."
On what SU needs to do to improve from last season:
"Turnovers, shot selection and defense. We want to be a team that executes our offense and plays good, solid team defense."
On having 10 players on the roster:
"It makes everybody important. My staff coached the BIG EAST All-Star Team last summer. We started with 14 players, but by the time we got to Boston College to start practicing for the tour we were down to 10. We went abroad with 10 players, had the opportunity to play everybody an equal amount of minutes and went undefeated. Ten can be good because it is an opportunity for everyone to play and everyone's role to be important. That's the way we're looking at it, but we still have to do the work."
Senior guard Jaime James
On being an underdog this season:
"That's just fine with me. I would rather go into a season as the underdog than have a target on my back. Basketball is a wonderful sport. You can beat any given team on any given day."
On the Orangewomen's schedule:
"I think it's a wonderful schedule. We get to travel to California and Miami so you won't hear me complaining. It is going to challenge us. We play a lot of good non-conference teams and our conference is always good."
Senior center Tara Trammell
On what SU must improve on defensively:
"We're going to concentrate so much on defense this year that I think it will come. We need to move our feet, work on help defense and our post defense. It is going to be tough to replace Leigh Aziz and Paula Moore who were so athletic that they could be out of position and still make the play. We need to more fundamentally sound."
On replacing last season's post players:
"Hopefully, Chineze (Nwagbo) and I will be able to pick up the slack. We were here last year so we know what it takes to play in the BIG EAST. We realize what needs to get done to make up for Leigh and Paula."
