The Oswego State women’s basketball team will look to recover from a disappointing year last season with a win in their opening game on Tuesday Nov. 22 against Clarkson University.

The Lakers went 4-21 last year, but the team was faced with extreme adversity and challenges before the season started after the team lost both their top scorers and their top rebounders.

Head coach Tracy Bruno has been coaching the team for 10 years. She has made the playoffs six times and has a total of 100 wins as Laker coach, including postseason wins.

Although last year was a disappointing season, Bruno was proud of the team’s strong efforts in both their games and practices and they did not let all the injuries get to them.

“Last year was a challenging year, one that we all learned a lot from, one that we are obviously thinking about in terms of motivating into this year but we have turned the page and are looking forward,” Bruno said.

Bruno is optimistic and excited about the upcoming season. She pointed to the variety of ways the team can score, their passing abilities, and their focus on defensive side of the floor.

“We feel positive and excited about the talent that we brought in our freshman class,” Bruno said. “We have a great mix of upperclassmen so our leadership is very strong.”

Optimism was a word not only voiced by Bruno after their practices, but also their players. Senior Mary Mazzela has high anticipations for not only herself, but also her teammates going into this season and she is showing why by the way she has been in practice.

“This year goes back to how I was originally recruited as a pass-first player,” Mazella said. “Last year was a lot of scoring and a lot of rebounds because we lacked in those areas. I’m going back to what I normally did as a point guard and score when I need to, but hopefully the scoring is more spread out across the floor because we have those kind of players this year.”

Last year New Paltz and Geneseo led the way atop the SUNYAC with both teams finishing 14-4 in the conference, with Fredonia and Cortland trailing just behind. Bruno expects that the SUNYAC will continue to remain highly competitive, but she sees no reason why Oswego State cannot compete against top conference foes.

“Some of the top teams have lost some players,” Bruno said. “There was a fair amount of graduation in the senior class from last year. I would anticipate Cortland to be strong. They have a guard-dominated lineup and we are going to be one of the bigger teams in the league. Geneseo is also always a team to contend with, since they are very well-coached and in terms of size they will matchup very well with us.”

In order to matchup against the top teams in the SUNYAC, the Lakers have been practicing drills and plays to use against their opponents’ strengths. Bruno said she has noticed the team’s intensity has improved exceptionally over last year’s team and she believes that intensity will help them early on and throughout the season.

While practices officially began about a month ago, the team has been playing pickup together since the start of the semester to build team chemistry. This system has made the team closer and enabled the upperclassmen to teach the new players plays and ways to improve.

“A lot of players came from programs that have one or two plays or just one set offense so we go over plays both before and after practice,” Mazella said. “If people are struggling with foul shots, post moves, stuff like that they always have the option to come work with us veteran players.”

At this point of the season, after weeks of practice, the team is anxious for their season opener on Nov. 22. Junior Courtney Ameele is looking forward to seeing if their hard work during the practices will pay off when the season finally begins.

“I’m looking forward to using a couple strategies from last season and starting winning games as a team,” Ameele said.

The women’s basketball team is a confident group and after a disappointing season a year ago. They will be opening the season with a chip on their shoulders, vying to get back to playing competive basketball in the SUNYAC.

“I’m excited because we have a quality five starters, but you go down to six to ten and we’ve got some good depth,” Bruno said. “Each person that comes in can do something different and I think that’s exciting for us.”