Iowa State women’s basketball isn’t quite at full strength yet, but fortunately the season doesn’t start officially until Monday.
The Cyclones will play an exhibition game Wednesday night at Hilton Coliseum (6:30 p.m. no TV) against Central in a tune-up for a highly anticipated year, with both star point guard Emily Ryan and Marquette transfer Kenzie Hare on pitch counts.
“She’s on a pitch count – her and Emily Ryan both are,” coach Bill Fennelly said. “It’s what the smart people say ‘a return to play protocol.’ They’ll both play, but they’ll be limited. If it was a regular season game, they would still be limited.”
Iowa State will also be without Massachusetts post Lilly Taulelei, who is rehabbing an ankle injury.
Players battling injuries hasn’t forced the Cyclones’ hands in changing rotations, but with four proven newcomers, the team has practiced with quite a few different looks.
One of those looks comes in sophomore Addy Brown playing the post, although that one is due in part to Taulelei’s absence.
“We’re experimenting with it. Because, some teams that we play, Audi (Crooks) will have a little bit of trouble guarding in space. It’s largely because of the depth we have in the wing. We want to have another option. When we scrimmaged (Green Bay) on Saturday, both teams agreed that no one was going to foul out, and Audi had four fouls two minutes into the second quarter… It’s just another option, especially with (Taulelei) out. It just gives us something unique and I think Addy can handle it.”
Fennelly said the Cyclones constructed their roster knowing Ryan, returning sophomore Arianna Jackson, and incoming freshman Reagan Wilson would be at the point guard position. At the post, it’s Crooks and Taulelei.
“The other (spots), we’re just spinning them through, trying to give them a chance,” Fennelly said. “Everyone’s had a lot of opportunities to show what they can do, and that’s what we’ve tried to do in practice… We’re just (scrimmaging) more than we ever have.”
The rotation is the biggest concern for Fennelly right now.
“I think the biggest thing is still trying to find our rotation, and trying to figure out how we’re going to manage the point guard position until Emily (Ryan) can get fully back, and just continue to figure out where to play people,” Fennelly said. “The good news is we have a lot of kids that can play. The bad news is we haven’t had enough people step forward and take control of spots, but that’s OK. We’ve practiced really hard.”
The other part for Iowa State to figure out – or wait to come naturally – is the team’s 3-point shooting.
The Cyclones don’t have a single guard on the roster who shot worse than 37% from behind the arc a season ago.
In practice, they haven’t seen a day where all of the long distance shots are finding the net, but that isn’t a concern yet and likely won’t be for a few games into the season.
“Our numbers have not been great – which, you can look at that a number of ways,” Fennelly said. “I’m not worried about it, mainly because they all have a track record of making shots. It’s not anything that – we haven’t had one of those days in our scrimmages where we’re making 50 percent of them. The shots we’re taking are good ones and we’ll continue to do that. I’m worried about a lot of things, but that’s not one of them right now.”
There’s plenty to figure out with just a handful of days left in the off-season, but that’s just what Iowa State wanted to find after its Round of 32 loss to Stanford that ended the last campaign.
The No. 8 Cyclones take the court at Hilton Coliseum for the first time this year on Wednesday.