New Era Begins With Exhibition Saturday Night

The promising Oregon women's basketball program, coming off a 24-win season and energized by the arrival of a historic seven-player recruiting class, is about to begin molding its reality.

The Ducks host Northwest Christian in an exhibition game Saturday in Matthew Knight Arena at 7 p.m. The program enters its third season under head coach Kelly Graves, its first without double-double machine Jillian Alleyne and maybe the last for a while in which Oregon isn't considered a preseason favorite in the Pac-12 Conference.

Last week, the Ducks were picked to finish seventh in the conference. With just one player, Lexi Bando, who has two years of experience in the program, that didn't seem unfair. But Oregon wants to show Saturday night, and beyond, that it's worthy of even more respect.

"We have a lot to go out and prove," senior post Jacinta Vandenberg said. "It'll be good to get out there and just show what we can do, even with such a young group."

Saturday's exhibition will be the unveiling of arguably the nation's best freshman class. Graves and his staff signed guards Sabrina Ionescu, Jayde Woods and Morgan Yaeger, and forwards Sierra Campisano, Lydia Giomi, Ruthy Hebard and Mallory McGwire over the past year, and they're all expected to contribute as freshmen.

That gives the latest edition of Graves' program a couple math problems. For one, once transfer Justine Hall becomes eligible later this winter, he'll have a full roster of 15 scholarship players eligible to contribute.

Graves said he recently ran an anonymous poll of his players, to gauge how many minutes each anticipates playing per game. The sum total was 270, not an outlandish figure considering there are 200 total minutes to go around in a regulation game, but one that reminded the coach of the juggling act he'll have to perform.

"It's so competitive for every spot," Vandenberg said. "We're so deep that it's not like, 'You're going to play 40 minutes, and you're going to play 20.' You've really got to work for every minute."

Giomi, one of the freshmen, said players will be accepting of their roles.

"It's about the team, and just coming out and playing as hard as we can," Giomi said. "Whether you're in there for three minutes or 14, you're going to play all of those minutes as hard as you can."

Those minutes might vary depending on the opponent Oregon is facing. Graves could field a guard-heavy lineup on some nights that features super sophomore Maite Cazorla with Bando, Ionescu, Trinder and Yaeger. Or he could go big with the likes of Giomi (6-foot-6), Vandenberg (6-5), McGwire (6-5) and Hebard (6-4) rotating up front.

"We have a really deep team, and we can have a bunch of different variations," Giomi said. "We have a lot of guards that can do a lot of different things, and a lot of posts that can do different things. Mixing and matching with that, it's going to be hard to predict who's on the court."

Graves gets his first chance at experimenting with all those parts in front of a home crowd Saturday night. The program appears to have a bright future based on the talents of the freshman class, and they take the first step toward that promise against Northwest Christian.

"We just want to play hard, number one," Graves said. "We want to stay healthy, number two. And have fun. With this many news players, the more chances you get to play under the lights, in front of a crowd, it's a bonus."