If the Elon women’s basketball team’s 9-21 and 11-21 records over the past two seasons taught them anything, it would be resiliency, according to head coach Charlotte Smith.
“Over the last couple of years, we've grown as a team, we've weathered adversity, and we're just really excited that all the pieces feel like they're falling into place this year,” Smith said. “Sometimes it feels like life is falling apart, but it's actually falling in place and everything is falling in place beautifully.”
It’s been a tough couple of years as the Phoenix only won eight home games over the last two seasons. Last season was marred by the season-long injuries of two of the team’s brightest stars: redshirt sophomore Raven Preston and redshirt junior Kamryn Doty. Smith said the absence of Doty and Preston taught the team some valuable things.
“It taught us the importance of just showing up when life is hard, and we've grown from those life lessons,” Smith said.
Smith expects Preston, who led the team in scoring two years ago, to pick up where she left off before her injury.
“We know that we'll get productivity from her in regards to offensive firepower,” Smith said. “She was terrific on the boards, and that's one of the areas where we've had a huge deficit the last couple of years.”
Smith said Doty’s basketball IQ will be crucial to leading the team, particularly the offense.
Doty said paying attention to the little things will be vital and stressed the importance of practice.
“It just starts at practice. You practice how you play at the end of the day,” Doty said. “So, if we are competitive, have high energy and practice consistently, then it will be easy to transfer that over to the game, rather than having to flip the switch when it comes game time.”
Doty said a potential obstacle is the team being guard-heavy, with 11 of their 15 players being guards, but she believes they can overcome that disadvantage.
“All of our guards have a lot of heart and we're tough, so it’s not going to be our downfall in any type of way,” Doty said.
Smith has high expectations for Preston and senior Iycez Adams, both of whom were named preseason All-CAA. She also cited the addition of the five new freshmen as a reason to get excited for the season.
“We have a lot of first-years coming in that are natural scorers,” Smith said. “I'm excited to hopefully get back to our goal of where we're averaging at least 70 points per game.”
One of those natural scorers is freshman Jayda Angel, who has been fantastic for the Phoenix so far, scoring more than 17 points in each of her first two games at Elon. Smith said getting freshmen like Angel involved early is a key part of their development. Smith said she believes Angel will have a big year due to her ability to create her own shot and clutch factor.
“It's both progressive and trying to get them to play early because you want to build their confidence in the non conference so that when the conference schedule hits, you've seasoned them to where they're almost sophomores now,” Smith said. “What we're trying to do right now is shorten their learning curve so that they all can be contributors this year.”
The Phoenix will be facing off against some major women’s basketball powerhouses this year with road games against Virginia Tech and the current No. 3 team in the country, the University of Southern California. Elon will play USC, who is led by one of the best players in the country in Juju Watkins, on Dec. 15. However, Doty said she believes it is a win-win situation.
“We approach them like we literally have nothing to lose,” Doty said. “Just take advantage of all the opportunities we have against them. I feel like games like this are learning opportunities to see what we can really be good at. I just go into those games with the idea just to have fun and just work on what we’ve consistently been working on in practice.”
Smith said she believes they are talented enough to capture their first Coastal Athletic Association championship since 2018, they just have to stay healthy. The team is driven to win a championship by an unlikely source: a magnet. According to Smith, the team receives a participatory magnet every year at the CAA Tournament after they lose. Smith, and the rest of the team, don’t want to come home with a magnet this time.
“When we're not competing to our highest potential, I'll stop in the middle of practice and say, ‘Do you want to come home with more than a magnet this year with your name on it?’ We want to come home with some hardware. That's our motivation: Come home with more than a magnet,” Smith said.