Time for tip-off

WOMEN’S BASKETBALL

The college basketball season begins for both Oklahoma and Oklahoma State on Friday with the Sooners at home against Belmont and the Cowgirls hosting Incarnate Word.

NORMAN — Don’t be surprised if many names and faces of the 2017-18 Oklahoma women’s basketball team seem unfamiliar when the team takes the court for the Friday night’s season-opener.

Though the No. 22-ranked Sooners are projected to start four players who have been on the team for at least four years, the bulk of this year’s production could come from new faces.

Coach Sherri Coale lost seven players after her team’s 23-10 season, including five to graduation and two more to transfer.

But Coale reloaded in the offseason, bringing in three freshmen who figure to be major keys for this year’s squad to achieve its goals.

“All three of our freshmen have been fantastic,” Coale said. “The one thing you can never know when you recruit a student-athlete is how they are going to learn. You can see what they can do and what they cannot do but you have no way of gauging what kind of learner they are going to be. On the women’s side it is a four-year process, so there is nothing more important than the ability to learn, and move on and grasp more.”

The trio of freshmen — Ana Llanusa, Shaina Pellington and Mandy Simpson — had standout games in the Sooners’ two exhibition wins earlier this week. Llanusa, a Choctaw product, averaged 21 points in those wins, while Pellington averaged 10.5 points and 5.5 assists.

Simpson, who’s tabbed

as a projected starter for Friday night’s game, picked up 17 rebounds against Central Oklahoma — the most in an exhibition game since Courtney Paris grabbed 18 in 2007. If she does indeed get the start, Simpson will be just the 10th true freshman to start a season-opener in the 22-year Coale era.

“All of these three freshmen are learners,” Coale said recently. “They really discuss information, make it apart of them and then move on to something else. That has me very excited because they all get a hitch and a need for what we have. They are all very different. Shaina is a speedy, athletic point guard. Ana is a scorer and perceptive athlete. She is very athletic. Then Mandy has the ability to do all the things that are the pause between the notes that make it work. She just does those things. She anticipates where the ball is going to go and gives it space, she sees when a shot is going to go up and crashes the glass, reads how a defender is guarding the screen and slips to the basket.”

With the graduations and transfers, the Sooners don’t have a deep bench and will likely have to get production from players like LaNesia Williams and Ijeoma Odimgbe, both of who had limited roles a season ago, along with veterans Maddie Manning, Vionise Pierre-Louis and Gabbi Oritz.

“All of these three freshmen are learners They really discuss information, make it apart of them and then move on to something else. That has me very excited because they all get a hitch and a need for what we have. They are all very different.” Coach Sherri Coale