Story Links
Oct. 16, 2001
Virginia heads into the 2001-02 season with a roster that looks significantly different from a year ago. The Cavaliers lost three starters from the 2000-01 squad that finished 18-14 and advanced to the NCAA Tournament for the 18th consecutive year.
Guard Telisha Quarles heads into her senior season as the leading returning scorer from last year’s team. She is joined in the backcourt by returning starting point guard Anna Prillaman. The duo accounted for 17.5 points per game between them last year. As the two players with the most on-court experience, UVa will rely on the pair to provide significant scoring output.
“Obviously [Quarles and Prillaman’s] roles become much bigger primarily in the area of helping the team gel and learn things quickly,” head coach Debbie Ryan says. “They’re going to have to score more and they’re going to have to be very solid defensively.”
In addition to Quarles and Prillaman, forward Anna Crosswhite and guard Safiya Grant also saw time last season for Virginia. Crosswhite played in most of Virginia’s games and provided depth in the frontcourt, while Grant saw limited time at guard.
With only four players returning to this year’s team, head coach Debbie Ryan will have to rely on her newcomers to make an immediate impact. The class, which Blue Star Basketball tabbed the 11th-best class in the country, features a number of high school All-Americans, and should have the talent to compete immediately at the Division I level.
“There is no way we are going to be able to field a team without first years on the court,” Ryan says. “Obviously first years are going to have to play and newcomers are going to have to play.”
Ryan heads into the season as the 13th winningest coach all time in Division I women’s basketball. At 544-197 all time, she is closing in on her 550th career victory. This season marks her 25th as head coach of the Cavaliers.
Backcourt
The backcourt will be the Cavaliers’ strength heading into the season. Virginia has a pair of proven guards with two returning starters in Quarles and Prillaman.
“[Quarles and Prillaman] are going to have to set good examples and they are going to have to be great role models from start to finish,” Ryan says. “That’s a huge thing to put on players like Telisha who has never had that role before, and Anna Prillaman who is just a sophomore. It’s going to be a situation where they have to teach, learn themselves, and then produce night-in and night-out.”
Quarles, a shooting guard from Louisa, Va., started 29 of 32 games last season and averaged 32 minutes, 11.6 points and 2.6 rebounds. She was a consistent threat from anywhere on the court last season, shooting an impressive 32 of 84 (.381) from behind the three-point arc.
As one of only two seniors on this year’s roster, and the only player with more than one year of experience in Ryan’s system, Quarles will absorb substantial scoring and leadership responsibilities.
Prillaman started 23 of the 27 games in which she appeared during the 2001-02 season. After a stellar high school career at Midlothian High School in nearby Midlothian, Va., where she earned Gatorade Player of the Year honors for the state of Virginia, Prillaman adjusted quickly to the demands of college basketball.
The 5-10 guard averaged 6.1 points and 2.1 assists per game during her freshman campaign, and shot .519 from the floor and .828 from the free throw line.
Grant, a sophomore from Bronx, N.Y., played in eight games for UVa last season. She averaged 1.8 points in limited action, and made five of six attempts from the charity stripe. Grant struggled with injuries throughout the year, but she showed an ability to get up and down the court quickly in her limited playing time.
Prillaman, Quarles and Grant will be joined in the backcourt by an inexperienced but talented group of athletes.
Junior transfer Liz Sahin is one player who could make an immediate impact in the Cavaliers’ backcourt. Sahin came to Virginia from Palm Beach Community College in Florida, where she averaged 15 points, eight assists and five steals as a guard. Sahin was the Southern Conference Player of the Year for the 1999-00 season and was named to the All-State team following the 2000-01 season.
“Liz is a true point guard,” Ryan says. “Her first inclination is to get the team set up, to play the system, but she can also score a little bit. She knows where to go with the ball. It is not going to be east-west, it is going to be north-south. I like players who get the ball and go.
“She is going to be the type of player that if she can learn the system quickly, then she could very easily challenge to start depending on how she does in the early preseason.”
The native of Samandag, Turkey was a member of Turkey’s National Basketball Team prior to moving to Florida in 1998.
LaTonya Blue will also compete for playing time in the backcourt. Blue Star rated Blue #80 overall among seniors last year. She was an honorable mention All-American for both USA Today and Street & Smith, and at 5-9, the Baltimore native can play either guard or forward for the Cavaliers.
“LaTonya was a very quiet player in high school,” Ryan says. “I think [she] is going to be a bit of a surprise to people. She is going to be a defensive stopper, she can score, she has a good inside-outside game, and she rebounds.”
Bethany LeSueur, a native of Garden City, N.Y., rounds out a talented Cavaliers backcourt. The 5-10 guard earned USA Today All-American honors and was a two-time Gatorade Player of the Year for New York. Blue Star rated the 2000-01 New York Miss Basketball the 12th-best prospect in the 2000-01 class.
Cherisse Graham will have to sit out this season after transferring from Purdue a year ago. The 5-7 guard from Conshohocken, Penn. was tabbed by Blue Star Basketball as the fourth-best recruit in the country for the 1999-00 season.
“[Cherisse] is a fabulous athlete,” Ryan says. “She is the type of player who can play the one or the two. It is going to make it tough for her to sit out a year, but she will grow in the program.”
Graham originally signed to play with Purdue before sitting out last season and transferring to Virginia. She averaged 18 points, five rebounds and five assists per game during her high school career, garnering first-team Parade and Street & Smith’s All-American honors. She will spend this year learning the system in practice, and will be ready to vie for significant playing time next year.
“[Cherisse] will be able to practice against great players, she’ll be able to prepare our players for what they’re going to see, and I think she is going to really be an impact player from the get-go,” Ryan says. “When she goes into the game next year, she will already be used to the system.”
Frontcourt
Crosswhite, a sophomore from Castlecrag, Australia, is the lone holdover from last season’s frontcourt. Crosswhite appeared in 30 games last season, making eight starts. She averaged 3.8 points and 2.1 rebounds in 15 minutes per contest, and recorded 43 assists, nine steals and seven blocked shots during her first season of play for Virginia.
Crosswhite’s presence in the frontcourt will be augmented by the addition of several new faces.
Brandi Teamer, a freshman from Joliet, Ill., is one player who could have an immediate impact in the frontcourt for the Cavaliers. Teamer was listed as the nation’s No. 48 recruit in the Class of 2000 by the All Star Girls Report. She originally committed to Virginia for the 2000-01 season, but attended The Miller School in Charlottesville, Va. last season and will join Virginia for the 2001-02 season.
“Brandi is a very athletic, strong, quick leaper,” Ryan says. “She is going to be a player who can really sort of step into [former Virginia standout forward Schuye LaRue’s] shoes, and maybe not fill them right away, but she will be there trying to take on that role a little bit more.”
Teamer was an all-state performer for three years at Joliet High School, before moving to the Berkshire school in Miami, Fla., for her senior season. Teamer is an outstanding athlete who also excelled in track.
Ryan will look to another first-year player, Jocelyn Logan-Friend, to develop quickly. Logan-Friend was a Gatorade Player of the Year for the District of Columbia and averaged 14 points, 10 rebounds and three blocks for her high school career. The native of Cheverly, Md. was an honorable mention All-American as named by both USA Today and Street & Smith.
“Jocelyn is a player for whom I think the sky is the limit,” Ryan says. “She is the type of player that I think will develop quickly because she has good intelligence and if she works hard then she will be someone who definitely causes a lot of havoc in our conference basically in every game we play.”
With the loss of a number of players off of last year’s team, the Cavaliers find themselves smaller than they were last year. Freshman Lynette O’Reggio will help address this problem by adding height to Virginia’s lineup. At 6-4, O’Reggio joins the program as a legitimate prospect at center. The Laurel, Md. native averaged 12 points, 14 rebounds and five blocks per game as a senior in high school en route to garnering County Player of the Year and All-State honors in 2001.
“Lynette O’Reggio is a true center, which we haven’t had in a long time,” Ryan says. “Lynette can get up and down the court, but she’s got a big strong body. She’s going to be an effective shot-blocker [and] a good rebounder.”
Senior Kathy Allen joins the Cavaliers’ roster this season after serving as a manager for the Virginia women’s basketball team for the past three seasons.
“Kathy Allen is the type of player who can get time if she takes on the role of defensive stopper,” Ryan says. “Kathy is going to be that kind of player that if she concentrates on one area of the game [such as] defensive rebounding, the offense is going to come.”
Allen was an all-county and all-area performer at Boyertown High School in Green Lane, Penn.
Schedule
Although Virginia will likely have to rely on a number of new additions to play prominent roles on this season’s squad, the Cavaliers’ schedule offers them little room for error. UVa faces at least 11 and possibly 12 teams during the 2001-02 season that participated in last season’s NCAA Tournament, including two games apiece against the five Atlantic Coast Conference schools other than Virginia that participated in the 2001 Tournament.
“We are going into [the season] with expectations that are the same that every Virginia team goes into the year with,” Ryan says. “[The players] understand that. I think they have already started to prepare themselves for that.”
The Cavaliers’ first game against a 2001 NCAA participant comes on November 20, 2001, when Virginia faces in-state rival Liberty at 7:30 p.m. in University Hall. Virginia follows that game with a Nov. 24 visit to 2001 NCAA participant Rutgers, and then five consecutive home games against teams from the 2001 NCAA Tournament field – Nov. 26 vs. Howard, Nov. 29 vs. Virginia Tech, Dec. 2 against U.C. Santa Barbara, Dec. 6 against Atlantic Coast Conference rival Duke, and Dec. 18 vs. Ohio State.
After a home game against Florida International on Thursday, Dec. 20, Virginia travels to the Tulane Christmas Tournament. Virginia takes on 2001 NCAA participant Long Island in the first game of the tournament, and could face Tulane, another member of the 2001 NCAA field, in the second contest.
Virginia then returns to ACC action, where it will play 2001 NCAA participants NC State, Maryland, Florida State, and Clemson two times each. The Cavaliers will also play the Blue Devils a second time during the conference schedule.
UVa’s success against a difficult schedule will hinge on the development of its young players. If Virginia can get consistent production from its freshman and newcomers, then sky’s the limit for this young, talented team.
“It will be a team that comes together as the year goes on,” Ryan says of her 2001-02 squad. “I think they already have good chemistry off the court. [The] team feels good about themselves and I think walking onto the court with that right from the start is a great thing.
“[The team has] a real good unity about them and that in itself is going to be something that helps us contend for an ACC and NCAA Championship.”