Minnesota West basketball: Reigning national champs are retooling in title defense

WORTHINGTON The reigning national champs are in the midst of reinventing themselves in their title defense.

The Minnesota West Community and Technical College womens basketball team is fresh off winning its first-ever NJCAA Division III championship, but many key faces from that team last year are gone.

ADVERTISEMENT Five sophomores that were all essential to the teams success a year ago have graduated, including all-conference forward Hattie DeVries and reigning two-time national player of the year Olivia Hayenga.

This years Jays will also be without key contributing freshmen from last year in forwards Skyla Petersen and Aisha Zeidi, who are both sidelined to injury.

Due to that, head coach Rosalie Moz Hayenga-Hostikkas team is relying on a lot of newcomers, including a whole new starting rotation, to keep the Lady Jays winning culture.

I think that it's just a lot of trying to figure out new roles, possibly new positions and Where do you fit in? Hayenga-Hostikka said.

I don't have good rotations yet as a coach, I'm trying to figure those things out too.

So I think it's just a lot of us trying to figure out what our roles are and where we fit in right now.

They are off to a winning start to this season so far with a 3-0 record, but it hasnt always looked pretty.

The Jays have averaged 30 turnovers per game through their first three games as roles and team chemistry are still being defined.

But the team is certainly not lacking in talent and it is even a bit bigger in numbers with 11 on the roster compared to just nine last year.

Guards Ava Parrish and Casey Miller are the two returners and they are taking on more leadership roles.

The rest of the Jays roster are freshmen and plenty are already making an impact.

Their leading scorer is forward Rhea Tucker from White River, South Dakota at 21.3 points per game.

She is also their leading rebounder at 12.3 per game and is tied for the lead in assists with 3.3.

Fellow forward Katrina Schutz from Richmond is another freshman standout.

She is scoring 16.7 points and grabbing 8.3 rebounds a game.

ADVERTISEMENT Jayda Hellewell from Balaton who attended Murray County Central High School is another solid forward who is averaging over seven rebounds a contest.

All three are very athletic forwards with an array of skills.

We're very athletic and probably part of our problem is me right now, because I see the athleticism, so I'm always, Let's go, let's go, Hayenga-Hostikka said.

Because our posts are not lumbering, big bang posts, our posts are athletic, more stretch fours that want to face the basket versus post up.

Then theres Maddie Kamm from St.

Peter, the teams point guard who Hayenga-Hostikka said has done a nice job at adapting to that role.

Worthington High School grad Pham Gora is another guard with speed and athleticism.

Two more on the roster are also on the Lady Jay volleyball team in Adrian native Sadie Krahling and Truman native Bethany Petrowiak.

With the volleyball team competing in nationals, neither has been able to play all three games yet as they will soon transition to basketball.

Krahling did start the Jays most recent game against Ridgewater College and she scored 12 points with three rebounds and four steals in her first game.

They've been great, Sadie and Bethany have shown up, Hayenga-Hostikka said.

It's hard on them, they've been doing two practices, but they still are missing things and and so then when they are here, we're trying to catch them up and I think that that's hurting our continuity just a little bit, but it's a good problem to have.

Its just allowing some other kids to get some reps and to figure some things out.

The Lady Jays are ranked fifth in the preseason NJCAA DIII Womens Basketball Poll.

Their three wins have come against Sisseton Wahpeton College in a doubleheader and then against Ridgewater.

ADVERTISEMENT They open Minnesota College Athletic Conference South Division play Jan.

8 at home against M State Fergus Falls in what could be a really tough region.

Four of the top five teams reside in Region 13, including the top three of Rochester, Northland CTC and Anoka-Ramsey CC.

The Jays went 5-2 against those teams last year en route to a 26-7 record and a national title.

But this is a new season and Minnesota West is mostly a new team.

While the team is quite different from the past couple of years, it looks to keep its winning formula going.

I don't know what our expectations are, Hayenga-Hostikka said.

I hate to put huge expectations, because we're so new and I think the sophomores, they know they've got that taste in their mouth of what they did last year, so they want that back extremely bad.

And the freshmen are like, Wow, how awesome is that? but don't really understand, maybe yet, what it takes to get there and what our league is like.

I think right now, it's a little bit of a cliche, but it's kind of one game at a time, like we're just trying really hard not to look at, Can we make the regional? I mean, it's like, Can we make this next pass and not throw it out of bounds this time? So I think I still have some pretty high expectations but it took me 32 years of coaching to get to a national championship game, so I don't really know that an expectation is that we'll be back there right away..

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