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Vanderbilt women’s basketball coach Shea Ralph announced Sunday that freshman center Amaury Williams has been fired from the team after suffering three season-ending injuries before the Commodores’ first game. In addition, Vanderbilt only has eight players available for the remainder of the season.
In January 2021, Vanderbilt opted out of the rest of the season entirely due to COVID-19 opt-outs and injuries. One of them was restricted after returning from the ACL tear he suffered the previous season. After opting out, then-coach Stephanie White was fired after several players entered the transfer portal.
There is no indication that the Vanderbilt team will close the season this year, and the Commodores now have more players available than they could at the same point in the 2021 season. But it’s also a rare circumstance where a team is forced to play an entire SEC season with just eight players.
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similar situation
UConn, where Ralph was an assistant from 2008 to 2021, is in a similar situation. The Huskies lost star Paige Bueckers to a torn ACL before the start of the season and had to postpone the game because they were under seven players. Big East must have a minimum of 7 scholarship players available to play.
Vanderbilt hasn’t reached that stage yet. The Commodores played one game in which he played seven, with an overtime win over Lipscomb in December. By the time the game went to overtime, he was only six available after Yaubrion Chambers fouled out. However, so far there are at least 7 available to start every game.
However, the Husky situation is a little more temporary. His two players, Bueckers and Ice Brady, will miss the season. Others have had short-term injuries, so UConn could get as many as 10 of his players if they all make it back. After one postponement, the Huskies have announced that the next game will go ahead as scheduled, with at least seven players.
In NCAA women’s basketball, a team must have five available players to start a game, but if a player is injured or fouled out during the game, the team will play with fewer players. A team with only one available player must withdraw unless both teams are still deemed to have a chance to win.
Vanderbilt postponed last season’s game against Texas A&M due to COVID-19 protocols. Ralph said there were five players on the team at the time. The Commodores have also postponed their game against Missouri due to COVID issues with the Tigers. Both games were later made up.
Some teams have chosen to play with fewer than seven players. The IUPUI men’s basketball team had six available players by the end of the 2021-22 season, but continued to play, losing all but one game in Division I competition.
In the 2021-22 season, Mississippi State women’s basketball had just seven players available for the final eight games of the season. The Bulldogs finished with a 6-10 conference record. They won two games played by just seven players, including one against Vanderbilt in January.
The Bulldogs successfully completed the regular season without canceling a game, but declined to bid for WNIT due to lack of available players.
When the Commodores won Kentucky last season, the Wildcats had only six players, one of whom was sent off for a foul. It was a temporary situation. Kentucky had seven players available in his three-week extension, but it was the only game the Wildcats played with his six, and by the end of the season he had nine players. was available.
opt out
The main difference between the ill-fated 2020-21 season and this season is that the specter of the pandemic has lingered significantly in 2021. Teams have already had him shut down twice due to COVID protocols, which are much stricter than they are now. Vanderbilt is far less at risk of losing a player to COVID two years later.
But some of the lessons of that season still stand. At the time, four players were sidelined with injuries that cost them all or most of the season, and Demi Washington’s case of myocarditis. The situation in Washington is pandemic-specific, and as with the number of opt-outs the team has seen, injuries have not.
Ralph affirms that the team can still play with eight players.
“I’ve had multiple championship-winning experience as an assistant coach, and I’ve played like six kids,” Ralph said Sunday. You only play with 8 kids, right? In basketball you have to be really smart and don’t get in trouble for shooting yourself in the leg, fouling or whatever. That way you can get creative with how you play on defense. ”
Last season, Vanderbilt mostly played with a nine-man rotation, while the Commodores had a few games with fewer. Vanderbilt faced his eight players in his four games in the SEC, and in one game he faced seven players, while the Commodores won in each of his four SEC victories. Played with at least 9 of him.
Even before Williams was sacked, she hadn’t played in a game since early December. All subsequent games have been played with seven or she eight players available, so the status quo is likely to remain unless further injuries occur.
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