The pandemic provides a lot of time to waste on lots of stuff. So I went back to see how Brandon, Caldwell and Gray did as freshmen.

Brandon ended up sixth in the league in rebounding at 8.5 per game. In the year-end NIT, she averaged 8.2 ppg and 11.8 rpg.

Caldwell shot 61.5% as a freshman and averaged 7.7 rebounds per game in the NIT.

Gray averaged 10.5 ppg and 6.0 rpg in her first season, and then scored 14 points and 6 rebounds against Iowa in a first round NCAA game and had 15 points against Notre Dame in a second round game.

The game-by-game stats were not available so I could not tell how they did in their first two games. They were all helped by strong backcourts that took the pressure off.

Katy Steding didn't end up with a good record as a head coach. But she did a great job for us in developing big people. Noticed that Steding is now back at Stanford as an assistant coach there.

I could see Michelle Onyiah performing as a Genn Brandon type rebounder. Dalayah Daniels could be on par as a scorer with Reshanda Gray and either, Sela Heide or Fatou Samb, could become a traditional center type like Caldwell. I can't remember the latter's first name. Help?

GO BEARS!

I still wonder to this day what cal could have achieved with Tierra Rogers healthy.

She's Talia Caldwell. I agree Michelle resembles Gennifer and Fatou resembles Talia. However I can't think of a recent Cal player much like Dalayah, a big with an outside game. I'd say Reshanda's game was strictly inside. You might have to go all the way back to Colleen Galloway to find a comparable Cal player. Hope Dalayah turns out that good.

Again, I hope that we will focus on boxing out and rebounding with our freshmen this year. That is what ended up being our biggest asset in the Brandon/Caldwell/Gray era. We could toss up errant shots and watch those three clean up time after time under the boards.

It's teaching, development and playing experience that will bring-out the talent these frosh possess.

stu said:

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She's Talia Caldwell. I agree Michelle resembles Gennifer and Fatou resembles Talia. However I can't think of a recent Cal player much like Dalayah, a big with an outside game. I'd say Reshanda's game was strictly inside. You might have to go all the way back to Colleen Galloway to find a comparable Cal player. Hope Dalayah turns out that good.

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Dalayah = Courtney?

HoopDreams said:

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Dalayah = Courtney?

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Good point. When Courtney was healthy she could do it all.

I went to a Cal Louisville game at Haas in Dec 2014 and Cal would have won it but Courtney was injured and unable to play