The women’s basketball team took its time off during the summer and used this time to improve itself both on and off the court. The team traveled to Spain to play some basketball and also grow the chemistry between the players.

The Judges are looking to build off of a season in which they went 16-12 in overall play and 5-9 against the conference and captured the Eastern Conference Athletic Tournament title. 

Playing better against University Athletic Association conference opponents will be a key for the squad to put together an impressive season.

The team will look to turn around losses from last season against rivals such as the University of Chicago and the Washington University in St. Louis. 

The Judges were defeated by both of these teams twice during the 2014 to 2015 campaign, with the biggest loss coming on the road at Chicago by a score of 86-69.

Victories against fellow UAA members Carnegie Mellon University, Emory University and Case Western Reserve University were instrumental in the Judges’ success last season. Those results will look to be copied this year, as the squad will play all of those teams twice in the coming season.

Key non-conference opponents for the coming year include matchups with regional rivals Tufts University, Emmanuel College and Roger Williams University. 

Last year the Judges narrowly defeated Roger Williams in a 73-71 showdown that went down to the last minute.

With the squad facing a nine-point deficit on the road, it went on a 15-4 run to narrowly win a tight contest.

The team followed up that game by beating Emmanuel by 11 points in a game that it controlled for all 40 minutes.The women hope to repeat those performances against Roger Williams and Emmanuel this coming winter season.

The showdown with Tufts in particular will be one to circle on the calendar. Tufts defeated the Judges last season en route to a Final Four appearance in the Division III National Championship. 

It will be imperative for the team to win these games before heading into a tough conference schedule against UAA opponents.

The Judges will be fully loaded for the winter as they only lost one player, guard Hannah Cain ’15, to graduation. Key contributors,  such as guard Frankie Pinto ’17, forward Maria Jackson ’17 and center Olivia Shaw ’18 will all be returning to the starting lineup for the team. 

While in Spain, the team got a chance to matchup with the Europe Basketball Academy. 

The competition posed an important experience for the squad, as it exposed them to an international team with a different style of play. 

The Judges hope to build off of this positive experience as they look ahead to a successful 2015 to 2016 season. 

—Noah Hessdorf