Women Pick Up First Win Against City Rival

For awhile this contest looked like a repeat of the opening loss at American. A furious second half, in which they outscored the Hawks 44-26, gave Drexel a 76-61 victory in their first home contest. The game started off slowly, much like the first time around. The Dragons found themselves trailing 10-0 before they knew what hit them. After an ice cold start, Gabriela Marginean got things heated up. Her scoring ability along with more strong play from freshmen Marisa Crane and Kamile Nacickaite really helped turn the tide. The Dragons found themselves down just three at halftime.

The second half started out in similar fashion to the first half, with the Dragons giving up easy baskets and struggling themselves on the offensive end. Marginean continued to look unstoppable as she scored time and time again off the dribble. She's so tough to guard because she has the ability to get all the way to the rim, change directions or pull up and shoot in the lane when a defender steps in. She finishes so well and often draws contact with her playmaking ability. Thanks also to an 8-9 night from the charity stripe, Gabi posted her second straight game over thirty points (35). She was also a key to a Drexel defense that stifled the St. Joe's attack. Gabi drew several offensive fouls on the Hawks throughout the contest.

Sophomore guard Jasmina Rosseel was on fire again from the perimeter as she buried 4 three poitners en route to 16 points. Jasmina nailed a huge bucket down the stretch to extend the Dragon's lead. She also had a very impressive 5 to 1 assist to turnover ratio. Jasmina could look to attack more, but she was very solid during this contest.

As mentioned earlier, the play of the freshmen was outstanding once again. Point guard Marisa Crane brings a speed element to the table that adds another dimension in the Dragons backcourt. She ran the offense effectively, dishing out 4 assists and turning the ball over just once. No one hit bigger shots in the game than the pair of three pointers that Marisa buried. The second one was really a dagger to St. Joe's comeback attempt.

Kamile Nacickaite struggled some from the field, but the freshman lead the way on the glass with 8 rebounds. She also displayed her fine all around game with solid 3 assists and 2 blocked shots to go with her aggressive defense. Both of the freshmen played well on the opponent's half of the court.

Drexel played much more aggressive on the defensive end in this one and forced more turnovers than in their opener. The defense continued to be a problem early on and the team clearly needs to start faster. The full court pressure defense plagued the Dragon's offense down the stretch. They were at least effective enough against it to hold onto a double digit victory.

Gabriela Marginean had a strong season last year, but is just playing out of her mind through the first two games of the season. She is averaging nearly half of Drexel's point thus far. She should see constant double and triple teams throughout the remainder of the season and others will need to step up. When everything comes together, it looks like this team can be a real force in the CAA.

Record Watch

Gabriela Marginean
Season Points to Date: 66 (33 ave.)
Career Points: 1,151 (11th all time)

Michelle Maslowski
Single Season Points Record: 625
Career Points Record: 1,900

Women Drop Opener to American

While you might have a pretty good idea of what to expect out of your team throughout the season prior to the start, how the team will come out and play in the first game is always a mystery. The Drexel women's basketball team opened their season on the road on Sunday afternoon at American University. The Dragons dropped their first game 74-65.

The women return several key components from last year's 18-12 team, including preseason Player of the Year Gabriela Marginean. With that said, they did have four seniors to replace. The Dragons got off to a slow start. They struggled with turnovers against the American press defense and also played poor defense on the other end of the court. About midway through the half, they found themselves is a hole that they'd be forced to climb out of throughout the remainder of the afternoon.

Drexel had no answer for American's duo Michele Kirk and Liz Lear. Jen Starnstrom, making just her fourth career start, struggled both on defensely and offensively (0-2 shooting and 3 turnovers) at the center position. Talented sophomore guard Jasmina Rooseel started off on fire from the outside, but turned the ball over four times and didn't play well on the defense end either. She was also in foul trouble through most of the game and that limited her minutes. Drexel tried to slow American down on the inside by inserting 6-4 Brook Cornish into the lineup. The struggles continued though for the Dragons as the stumbled into the locker room down 38-23.

Things weren't much better at the start of the second half. Drexel finally got it going with a lineup that included three freshmen, Kamile Nacickaite, Tyler Hale and Marisa Crane. All three brought energy and aggressive defense to the table. Kamile showed her fantastic all around skill set as she shot the ball, drove to the hoop, set up teammates and rebounded. Crane's quick ball handling helped Drexel break the American press. Hale brought effort and activity on both ends for the floor.

The Dragons eventually cut the score to 48-46 before youth got the better of them. They went back to turning the ball over as they had in the first half and had some breakdowns defensively too. The sharper American team was too much to overcome.

While the play of the freshmen was key to keeping Drexel in it for awhile, Marginean was really the catalysis as usual on the offensive end. The star player carried her teammates on her back during that second half run. Despite facing constant double and triple teams, Gabi still managed to score 22 second half points. Even though she had a great game, she uncharacteristically missed 3 or 4 shots from point blank range and that really could've help the Dragons even more in their comeback bid.

One of the big questions coming into this season was how deep this team would be. You never know what to expect from the incoming freshmen until they take the court. The three rookies far exceeded expectations in their debut. That said, they also still made youthful mistakes which cost this team in the end. This squad should only get better as they become more seasoned.

Drexel certainly looks deep at the SF and PF spots. Marginean was a known commodity there, but the play of Nacickaite and Hale should give them a solid rotation (although Marginean won't leave the court much) and flexibilty. Surprisingly absent from that spot was do everything senior forward, Nicole Hester. She has been slowed by injury during the preseason and appeared out of shape in her 12 minutes on the floor. When she works her way back into condition, Dragons forward positions could be downright scary.

The same issues that have hurt Drexel the last few seasons came to surface in the season opener. While they've had production from the forward spot, they've really struggled at the center position. Using the trio of Marginean, Hale and Nacickaite might've been effective against American, but they would likely struggle against the bigger frontcourts in the CAA. To beat and finish ahead of those teams, they are going to need strong defense and rebounding from Jen Stjarnstrom and/or Brooke Cornish. Both will also need to become at least some sort of threat on the offensive end. Hopefully Stjarnstrom can improve and get more comfortable as she spends more time on the court (averaged only 6.5 minutes per game last season). Cornish improved as the season went on last year, so that's a reason for hope.

The other achilles heal for the Dragons over the last few years has been ball handling and more specifically breaking the full court press. Andrea Peterson had a 2 to 1 assist to turnover ratio in the game, but still seemed a bit slow after coming back from a knee injury. Marisa Crane was effective beating the American press when she was inserted into the game, but she needs to improve her decisioning making as was evident by her four turnovers. The turnovers were nearly even in the end, but American's 22-4 advantage in fast break points was the difference in the game.

Drexel is much better at beating the press when Gabi handles the ball, but often they don't look to her to do so until they've turned the ball over several times. The other issue is that even when they successfully break the press, the Dragons rarely convert for easy baskets. Often they waste a lot of time in the backcourt and don't even get into their offensive sets until the shot clock is winding down.

It wasn't a pretty start for the Drexel women, but if last year taught us anything it's that you can't count this team out early. A slow start didn't hinder the team as in 2007-2008 as they still finished 18-12. If they want to improve upon that though, they're going to have to make adjustments in the areas that have hurt them in the past.

Record Watch

Marginean came into her junior campaign just over 800 points shy of the career scoring mark. A running tally of her single season and career total will be posted on here throughout the season.

Gabriela Marginean
Season Points to Date: 31 (31 ave.)
Career Points: 1,116 (13th all time)

Michelle Maslowski
Single Season Points Record: 625
Career Points Record: 1,900