By Jonathan Sawyer
Assistant Sports Editor
The Bonnies won in commanding fashion in their home opener and in the first round of the pre-season Women’s National Invitational Tournament (WNIT) on Friday Nov. 13, against the Siena Saints, 57-40.
On Sunday, the Bonnies visited the number 22 team in the nation, the DePaul Blue Demons in the second of the WNIT. Being down the whole game, the Bonnies struggled and lost 77-54.
Although it’s early for the Bonnies, Head Coach Jim Crowley believes his team is showing potential but still needs to keep working hard to improve, he said.
“I like how hard our team is playing, and we are showing the ability to play a lot of different people,” Crowley said. “We are not taking care of the ball very well at all, and our shot making is not at the level it should be.”
Senior forward Katie Healy believes that even though her team is struggling with shooting, the energy is one of the biggest strengths on the team, she said.
“We approach games like it’s our last one, and we play really hard,” Healy said. “We have a lot of offensive threats on our team, so that’s definitely a plus, and we are starting to really understand how hard we can defend.”
Healy said she believes second chance points is something that the Bonnies need to improve on.
“[We have to work on] not letting teams get anything back to back on us,” Healy said. “If we make one mistake, we can’t let it lead to two. For example, we can’t let a team get back-to-back offensive rebounds, or we let a player get easy shots in a row.”
Sophomore forward Miranda Drummond went from coming off the bench to a starting role this season and leads her team in points with 13 per game. Putting a lot of emphasis on her jump shot is a way that Drummond said she improved over the summer.
“Last year, I was more of a drive player, and I wanted to improve my jump-shot and be more versatile,” Drummond said. “I would get in the gym and put up 400 to 600 shots a day and did whatever I could to help out this season.”
The Bonnies have struggled so far this season shooting beyond the arc, going four for 30 in the first two games.
Crowley said he believes that it’s something that needs to be fixed.
“It is without a doubt a problem and something we need to fix,” Crowley said, referring to the shot stats. “We need to make sure the right people are taking the right shots, and our shooters need to spend a lot of timing honing their craft of shooting.”
The Bonnies go on the road Saturday to play the Drexel Dragons at 5 p.m.
