Adding more scorers leaves Foley optimistic
Joe Foley has 801 career victories on his coaching resume, but he also has learned a thing or two about losing in his 34 seasons coaching women’s basketball at the college level.
First, Foley said: “No one’s having fun when they’re getting their tails beat.”
It’s safe to say Foley, his coaching staff and the UALR players did not enjoy last season when the Trojans finished 12-19, a record that included losses in eight of their final 10 games.
It ended a string of 13 consecutive winning seasons for Foley at UALR, a stretch when the Trojans won 20 or more games 12 times.
Last season wasn’t a good time, Foley said, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t educational.
“My theory in coaching is you learn a lot more from losing than winning,” he said. “A lot of times when you’re winning you have a tendency to let things slide. If you shoot the ball well, it covers up most of your sins. You win, and you may not be playing as well as you should or could.
“I knew we had a lot of youth last year, I knew it was going to be a tough year. I was hoping we could battle through it and get ’em ready, and I didn’t do it. You’re always disappointed in yourself when you don’t do well. Look at the North Carolina men last year. It happens, you don’t like it. Hopefully, it makes you tougher, makes you work a little harder.”
And what exactly did Foley, who enters his 18th season at UALR, learn?
“We’ve got to do little things, you’ve got to be able to score the ball,” Foley said. “Defense solid enough, we just couldn’t score. We didn’t have any proven scorers. We’ll score much better than what we did last year. I don’t think there’s any doubt about that.”
The scoring issues that hurt the Trojans last season (55.4 ppg, 38.3% shooting from the field) have been addressed.
Two Division I transfers — Bre’Amber Scott (Mississippi State) and Brianna Crane (Murray State) — are part of the reason for Foley’s optimism.
“The transfers are going to be the key,” Foley said of Scott and Crane. “I think they’re ready to help immediately.
Scott, a 5-11 guard who played at Little Rock Central, averaged 7.1 points for a 201819 Mississippi State team that advanced to the Elite Eight of the NCAA Tournament.
Scott shot 45.7 percent from the field and 37% behind the three-point line in 58 games for the Bulldogs.
Crane, a 6-0 forward, averaged 7.2 points and 4.9 rebounds in 2018-19 after averaging 7.2 points and 5.7 rebounds as a freshman.
Scott and Crane will take the pressure off 6-1 senior forward Teal Battle, who averaged 13.6 points and 5.7 rebounds in 32.7 minutes per game.
“We’ll start juniors and seniors,” Foley said. “Hope that helps us stay level, a little bit more ready to play.”
In addition to Scott and Crane, junior-college transfer Mayra Caicedo, a 5-3 point guard from Buga, Colombia, will take over at point guard.
Caicedo averaged 5.6 points, 3.3 assists, and 3.1 steals per game at New Mexico Junior College.
“One of the quickest players we’ve had,” Foley said. “She’s something to watch defensively. She gets after the ball really well.”
Another junior-college transfer, 6-1 forward Dariel Johnson, averaged 15.4 points and 14.5 rebounds last season at Pasadena (Calif.) City College and will provide a presence inside.
“That gives us six kids with pretty great experience,” Foley said.
Contributions are also expected from 6-2 sophomore post Alayzha Knapp, who is recovering from injury and still getting up to speed, and 6-2 senior forward Krystan Vornes.
Knapp and Vornes combined to start 32 games a year ago.
Angelique Francis, a 5-11 sophomore who played in 27 games last season, is another who could crack Foley’s 8-man playing rotation.
Foley said last season the Trojans relied too much on senior guard Kyra Collier, who led the team with a 14.6 scoring average.
“I think everybody stood around and looked at Collier, like, you’ve got to do all the scoring,” Foley said of Collier, whose eligibility has expired. “She’s not that type of player and she just couldn’t do it. That’s just too much to put on a guard. She worked her tail off.”
A stout nonconference schedule awaits the Trojans, as in customary in recent seasons, with Rice, Vanderbilt, Texas A&M and the University of Arkansas all slated to come to the Jack Stephens Center.
The conference schedule has been adjusted for the covid-19 pandemic: UALR will play four games against four other teams in the Sun Belt West Division: Texas Arlington, Louisiana-Lafayette, Texas State, Louisiana-Monroe and two more against Arkansas State
The games will be played weekly on Friday-Saturday, with games against the same opponent at home and away.
“It’s not what you want to do as far as coaching, play against teams four times, but it’s probably the safest thing to do at this time,” Foley said of the Friday-Saturday games against the same team. “I think it’s going to be unique.”