Mittie Wraps Up Frogs' Summer Tour of Vancouver
8/26/2010 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Aug. 26, 2010
The TCU women's basketball team recently returned from a nine-day, six-game summer tour of the Vancouver area of British Columbia, Canada. The Frogs, which played by international rules featuring eight additional minutes per game and an abbreviated shot clock, dominated their competition to the north, posting a perfect 6-0 record and averaging 98.3 points per game.
Individually, seniors Emily Carter and Helena Sverrisdottir showed flashes of why the upcoming 2010-11 season should be another successful one for the Frogs. Carter led the squad in scoring with a 21.0-point average and shot 54.0 percent from the field, including a sizzling 60.0 percent (18-of-30) from 3-point range. Sverrisdottir was as solid as she has been in her entire career, averaging 18.2 points per contest. She joined Carter with the hot touch from outside the arc, making 18-of-34 attempts (52.9 percent). Sophomore DeLisa Gross also had a standout week, scoring 12.8 points per contest.
One of the most important aspects of the tour was the opportunity to suit up four of the program's six summer additions. Briesha Wynn, a 6-0 freshman guard from Fort Worth-area North Crowley High School, had the best trip, as she was one of four TCU players to average double figures in scoring (12.0 ppg). Also getting their feet wet were freshmen guards Jacqueline Chandler and Meagan Henson and freshman forward Aron Garcia.
GoFrogs.com caught up with head coach Jeff Mittie following the team's return to Fort Worth to get his thoughts on the experience and put a wrap on the squad's trip north of the border.
On the positive aspects of the summer tour:
"We gained some valuable practice time prior to the trip. We were able to get good individual evaluation, as well as see our team working on some new things offensively. I think the practice time was very valuable. As far as the trip itself, we had an opportunity to play a lot of different people and feature a lot of different combinations. Often times you don't have that opportunity during the regular season. The competition was not up to the level that we're going to see this winter, but for August it gave us a good chance to play against somebody else, play against people who might defend against us differently. Each of those things are positives for our team."
On what he saw from his team that he liked:
"As the trip progressed, I think we were able to do more offensively. We went into this pretty basic. We wanted to let them play, to find out if they were comfortable to play when they drifted there on their own. As the trip progressed, I think we saw better chemistry on the floor with our group. We gained a good evaluation of what our players can do and what they need to get better at."
On what aspects the team needs to improve upon:
"There were some things we weren't good at, but for August, we had many things we did pretty decent. We were better defensively as the trip progressed, and that was not really an area we spent our time on at practice before we left. We really spent our time on individual improvement and installing the offense, but the defense did show progress. I think the freshmen played more consistently as the trip went on.
"You come back with maybe more to work on, because now you see them in actual game situations. But I hope what you get out of this coaching staff-wise is that you get a lot of video that you can analyze and evaluate, and you hope you go into the fall able to coach them better."
On the benefits of the trip related to the incoming freshmen:
"We seem to have some playmakers in this group. Briesha Wynn put up some good numbers. She showed improved shot selection and recognition as the trip went on. I think Aron Garcia made some big plays, blocked a lot of shots. Defensively, on the perimeter, she got better as the trip went on. Meagan Henson and Jacqueline Chandler I think both did a better job initiating offense as the trip went on. So I thought we saw good things out of everybody. That's the one advantage to this trip. If somebody's struggling, you can leave them in the game, have them fight through it and see how they react to some adversity. We didn't really face a lot of adversity because of the scores, but we really tried to get our players to play each possession regardless of the score. Sometimes we were successful in doing that and sometimes we weren't."
On the chemistry of the team:
"You can definitely which group of players have played together, and they've even improved their chemistry on the court from last year. Ice (Helena Sverrisdottir) knows where Emily Carter is going to be on a fast break. Emily knows when Ice is in trouble and needs help and vice versa. It's good to see Micah (Garoutte) and Rachel (Rentschler) play well. We weren't able to play Micah extended minutes because of a foot injury last year, and she played better as this trip went on. So our veteran group, you could see there was chemistry on the court where they really read each other very well."
On the team-building effects of the trip:
"We were able to spend a lot of quality time together, whether it was just around the hotel or the activities we took part in at Whistler like the whitewater rafting. We had players do things that they never would have been able to do. We had players who had never been on the water and they were able to experience things they had never been able to experience."
On the highlight of the trip:
"I think the trip to Whistler was the highlight. The town helped Vancouver host the Winter Olympics. We stayed relatively close to that Olympic Village. We also stayed in condos there that housed more than the hotel rooms we usually have on the road, and I think that was a great way for the team to bond and to spend more time together. We did this zip-line challenge course that I originally thought was going to be somewhat relaxing and fun, but not too taxing. In actuality it turned into a challenging three-hour marathon of 60-some games with zip-lines. Our team was pushed out of its comfort zone, so that was great. There were many times even I had to question myself if I really wanted to be up there. We also went whitewater rafting, and 85-90 percent of the team had never done that before. Also, it didn't hurt to escape the Texas heat of August."
On playing by international (FIBA) rules:
"The biggest difference in the play is that we were able to extend the minutes to 12 minutes per quarter (from 20-minute halves), so that enabled us to get some extra individual playing time. The 24-second shot clock (as opposed to the college 30-second clock) actually fit in well with what we worked at in the spring. One of the things I think we haven't been very good at is getting five players on the same page as quickly as we needed to offensively. We spent all spring in the film room trying to emphasize that point. With the 24-second shot clock, you had better get all five players on the same page quickly. I think our team did a pretty good job with that during the trip. It fit right into what we felt like was a weakness coming out after spring and moving forward."
