Tuesday, November 18, 2014
Penguins have lost five straight against Kent and trail 27-12 in series
By Joe Scalzo
YOUNGSTOWN
Youngstown State hasn’t won a women’s basketball game at Kent State since Bill Clinton was president and John Barnes was serving as a player-coach in Denmark.
That streak sounds worse than it is — it’s only a span of six games — but for a lot of reasons (pride, recruiting, conference rankings), the Kent State game takes on extra importance.
“You definitely want to win the games against the universities closest to you because a lot of times you are recruiting the same players,” said Barnes, YSU’s women’s coach. “I think two years ago the Horizon League was ranked ahead of the MAC [Mid-American Conference] and last year I think the MAC went back ahead and was ranked ahead a little bit. Anytime Horizon League schools can go up against the MAC and beat them, it helps our league and our getting WNIT berths and maybe, possibly, at-large NCAA berths.
“With the MAC conference being close to us and we’re compared to them a lot, it’s nice to beat the MAC teams.”
Kent State is 27-12 all-time against YSU and has won five straight overall. The Penguins’ last win came on Nov. 24, 2001. Today’s meeting is the first since December of 2010, the same season the Golden Flashes went 20-10.
Kent has gone a combined 16-72 since then, including a 74-68 loss to North Dakota State in Friday’s season opener.
The Flashes have good size with six players 6-foot or taller, including 6-4 senior center CiCi Shannon.
“Kent is big,” Barnes said. “They like to pound the ball inside and they have a good perimeter core that can really attack the basket, so they’re a good all-around team.”
Arbanas honored
YSU freshman guard Nikki Arbanas was named the Horizon League freshman of the week after scoring 25 points in the Penguins’ 83-61 win over Niagara on Saturday.
“It’s definitely very exciting,” said Arbanas, who graduated from Hickory High in Hermitage. “I just hope to move my level every game and not settle for what I do right now.”
Arbanas’ output was the most by a YSU freshman in a season opener in the Division I era. It was the seventh-highest total overall by a Penguin in her first season. She finished 5-of-5 from 3-point range and 8 of 9 from the field overall.
“It’s very exciting for her,” Barnes said. “You couldn’t ask for much more from a debut for a freshman. I thought she handled herself very well. A lot of times there’s nerves and things for a newcomer but she did a great job not only on making her shots, but they put on a lot of pressure and she did a good job against the pressure.”
The Penguins have seven freshmen on their 13-player roster, including two starters: Arbanas and guard Indiya Benjamin, who had 11 points and six assists on Saturday. Guard Kelley Wright (11 minutes) was the only other freshman to play more than five minutes against Niagara and Kelsea Newman (26 minutes) was the only other bench player who played more than six minutes.
That will change, Barnes said.
“A lot of our bench players have never played in a college game or if they did it was very, very sparingly, so they need to get used to that pace and level of play,” he said. “The more minutes they get, they’ll be more comfortable and be able to make a solid impact and a positive impact through their minutes.”
Incoming talent
Barnes brought in one of the highest-ranked recruiting classes in YSU history last week, signing five Ohioans, including West Branch guard Melinda Trimmer and five-star recruit Bre Berryman of Indian Creek. The 6-foot-5 center was ranked as the third-best player in Ohio by ESPN.
Three recruits are 6-foot-2 or taller. Senior Latisha Walker (6-2) is the tallest Penguin on the current roster.
“Very excited about the ’15 recruiting class,” said Barnes, whose offense is built around post players. “We’ve got 6-5, 6-3, 6-2 coming in. And we needed to add that size. We’re losing our front line in Heidi [Schlegel, who is 6-0] and Tish in terms of the seniors and the experience, so we needed to have a really good front line class and we were able to get some guards to come in and put depth to the class.
“It was an exciting year for us.”