Here we go. The first in our series of Comings and Goings for the 2017-18 season. Our order is random; rest assured we’ll get to your school.
We’ll start with James Madison, runner-up in the CAA last year. The Dukes fell to Villanova in the third round of the WNIT.
Goings
Precious Hall: All-everything Duke returned from ACL surgery to score 841 points and land on the Naismith Watch list. Scored a single-season record 46 against Rutgers, buried a three from the key to force OT against Villanova in the WNIT and carried the Dukes offense on her back, averaging 23.7 ppg. Signed a contract to play in Spain.
Savannah Felgemelcher: the 6-3 forward transferred to Radford, the team she started against in the first round of the WNIT. Averaged 3.1 ppg last season as a sophomore coming off the bench.
Amber Porter: dismissed from the team in September for violation of rules; averaged 8.5 ppg, 4.5 rpg last season
Ashlee McGee: the assistant to coach Sean O’Regan resigned in May
Comings
Ashley Langford: former ODU assistant to Karen Barefoot joins Regan’s staff; Tulane graduate and former Auburn assistant was also recruiting coordinator for the Naval Academy
Kelly Koshuta: 6-2 freshman forward and transfer from Virginia Tech who is eligible this season; Five-star ESPN Gurlz recruit from James Madison High in Vienna; 2015 Washington Post All-Met Player of the Year; played in just seven games her freshman season at Tech; twin bro plays football for the Hokies
Tori Harris: 6-foot freshman guard from Dix Hills, N.Y.; 2017 Long Island Player of the Year
Breyenne Bellerand: 5-10 forward from Emerson, N.J.
Debra Ferguson: 6-4 center and transfer from Virginia who is eligible at the conclusion of the fall semester.
Who’s going to take all the shots? We’ve gone from Tamera to Dawn to Tarik to Precious to . . . ? That’s the question. O’Regan talks about creating a three- or four-headed monster this season, but we’ll believe it when we see it. Hall is a huge loss. She was the offense last year; every play ran through the fifth-year senior, who rebounded from ACL surgery to become CAA Player of the Year. We can only hope Kayla Cooper-Williams, who tore her ACL a year ago in preseason, will recover as smoothly. Once conference season begins, we expect Cooper-Williams to factor in, particularly on the boards.
Kamiah Smalls, the easy choice for league Rookie of the Year, averaged 9 ppg last season, and she’ll need to pick up her offense even more as a sophomore. The player with the biggest upside on paper is Koshuta. We’re not sure if JMU has ever had a five-star ESPN HoopGurlz recruit on the roster before, and it’s exciting to see what the Northern Virginia native will bring after essentially two years of not playing. Koshuta transferred from Virginia Tech (Goodbye Kenny, Hello Sean) and is eligible this fall. Hokie fans never really got why the 6-2 forward was considered the fourth best post player coming out of high school. Physically imposing, Koshuta is key in providing the scoring these Dukes will need in trying to wrestle the CAA away from 2016-17 champion Elon.
“She has an unbelievable knack for scoring,” O’Regan said.
Koshuta’s defense and rebounding will be key to keeping her on the floor.
Smalls will have the ball in her hand a lot after shooting .508 last year.
We’ll admit, we wish Porter was on this roster, but the Dukes have a knack for overcoming what sometimes look like insurmountable circumstances. A year ago, they lost leading rebounder Da’Lishia Griffin in December and of course, Cooper-Williams went down with the knee, yet JMU finished the CAA runner-up.
Along with Koshuta, we expect Lexi Barrier, Logan Reynolds and Hailee Barron to pick up their scoring; Tasia Butler continues to recover from foot surgery, though was cleared last week.
“Lexi has a chance to be an all-conference level player,” O’Regan said. “Her and Kamiah will be a pretty important duo for us on the wing.”
We’re not expecting Ferguson to provide a major impact as she’s coming off ACL reconstruction in April. She will not be eligible until the spring semester.
JMU has been the best team in the state, and once we see how the offense shakes out, we’d put them up there alongside Virginia and Virginia Tech as tops in our state.
The schedule is excellent with trips to Tennessee (no more Diamond Deshields) and Dayton and Florida State coming to the Convo.
Photo courtesy of JMU Sports Information