Lehigh University Athletics
Lehigh completes a busy day in Iowa on Saturday
3/20/2010 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
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AMES, Iowa – Lehigh continued to work towards its NCAA Tournament first-round matchup with the fourth seeded Iowa State Cyclones on Sunday as they finished off a busy Saturday. The Brown and White gathered as a team to watch film, met with the media, had an open shoot-around and followed that up with a full practice. After the busy day the Mountain Hawks were able to head to dinner and close out the day with some team bonding.
The Brown and White started its day off by enjoying some pizza and watching film of the Cyclones in the hotel lobby. After lunch Lehigh headed to the Hilton Coliseum where it spent a half an hour meeting with the media. Head coach Sue Troyan, junior Erica Prosser and senior Tricia Smith all took part in a press conference to discuss Sunday’s game.
Troyan gave a few of her thoughts on Iowa State, “They’re an outstanding basketball program with a rich tradition of success. They’re a team that shoots the three very well and defending the perimeter for us is going to be important. Also, defending (Anna) Prins inside at 6’ 7” is going to be important as well.”
Earlier in the day, Iowa State head coach Bill Fennelly spoke about the challenge of facing Lehigh, “I think two things, right off the bat, are they are a very balanced team and we’ve always had great success guarding teams that have players that we can focus on and that is hard to do with their team. Their scoring is balanced. We don’t see a lot of changing defense in our league, and they change defense a lot. We’re going to see things we haven’t seen, whether it’s a triangle and two or a zone press, those are things we’ve tried to focus on in practice.”
The marquee match-up in the game is going to feature point guards Allison Lacey (Iowa State) and Prosser. Troyan commented on the role of each player. “I think they are the engine that drives both programs, honestly. You look at what Lacey does for her program, offensively she’s a tremendous player in terms of her ability to score, shoot the ball, and she can score in different ways and distribute the ball just as well. Erica’s role in our program is very much the same in terms of, you know, she’s the one that runs the show for us and has the ball in her hands. We rely a lot on her decision-making on both ends.”
Prosser talked about Lacy, “She’s a great player, obviously; she is the leader for this team, and she is very talented. She’s smart, so it’s going to be a tough challenge for me personally guarding her and as a team focusing on her and playing tough defense.”
The Cyclones will have a big advantage on Sunday with the opportunity to play on their home court, but Prosser is looking forward to the experience. “It will be a new experience for us, but it will be great. It’s a great atmosphere that adds a lot to the experience, especially for people who weren’t on the team last year. I’m really impressed with the following that Iowa State has, and I know our fans support us home in Bethlehem.”
Senior Alex Ross spoke about the opportunity to play in front of a big crowd, “Last year, we played in front of a huge crowd at Rutgers (against Auburn in the 2009 NCAA Tournament) and just having that experience, coming in here and playing against Iowa State, we know they pull a very large home crowd. And so I think that experience from last year will definitely help us come in here and play in front of such a tough crowd.”
Lehigh followed up its interview session with an open practice for fans and media. After the hour long shoot-around the team made its way back over to the Sukup Basketball Complex for its final practice before Sunday’s game.
The Mountain Hawks and Cyclones will tip-off at 9:30 p.m. EDT on Sunday after No. 5 Virginia takes on No. 11 Green Bay at 7:21 p.m. You can listen to the game live on WLVR-FM (91.3) with Jeff Tourial calling the action. The game will be shown live on ESPN2 with Bob Picozzi and Jimmy Dykes on the call.
Lehigh - Iowa State Preview
