PRINCESS ANNE, Maryland — Two years ago, the University of Maryland Eastern Shore traveled to William & Mary in November as a team trying to find itself.
On Tuesday (Nov. 23) at 6 p.m., the Hawks 2-2 host the Tribe in a bit of the same place, but with some momentum. Coming off of by far the best performance of the season, head coach Fred Batchelor is looking for continued improvement in the last game before a short holiday break.
"We need to do the little things," Batchelor said. "I thought we matched Drexel's effort on Saturday, which was huge because they play really hard and they take advantage of opportunities. I thought we took away a lot of easy buckets and things that they wanted to do, but I thought we still had moments that they were able to get those easy buckets.
"So really the biggest thing for us again against William & Mary is to keep the ball out of the paint — particularly on dribble penetration by their two talented guards — keep them out of the lane, make them shoot contested 3's and rebound the basketball."
Defensively, The Tribe presents some challenges for the Hawks because of the talent and experience in the backcourt.
Graduate transfer Riley Casey came from Columbia where she graduated with a B.A. in economics last spring and is working on her M.B.A. Kate Sramac came from Cornell where she graduated last year with a B.S. in communications.
Casey is averaging a team-high 13.5 points per game to go along with 3.0 assists. Sramac leads the team in rebounding from the guard position with 5.8 and also scores.
Casey's starting backcourt mate Sydney Wagner is third on the team in scoring with 11.5 points per game and leads in assists with 3.3 per game.
"Wagner is probably the most explosive player on the team," Batchelor said. "She is capable of giving you 20 on any given night. We have got to keep them out of the lane. The one thing they do a great job of is running offense — running it down to the last option and then finding ways to capitalize after that."
Offensively, the Hawks will continue to shake off the rust of a year without games, but there has been progress. Four different players have led the team in scoring this season so far and six different players are averaging more than five points a game.
Eastern Shore shot 50% from the field against the Dragons and had 28 points in the paint — numbers that had a lot to do with one another.
"It would be nice for us if we can score a little more than we did against Drexel," Batchelor said. "I still don't think we have played our best offensive game yet."
