{"id":36185,"date":"2025-11-03T18:10:11","date_gmt":"2025-11-03T18:10:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/36185\/"},"modified":"2025-11-03T18:10:11","modified_gmt":"2025-11-03T18:10:11","slug":"womens-basketball-dribbles-back-into-action","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/36185\/","title":{"rendered":"Women\u2019s basketball dribbles back into action"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Long Beach State women’s basketball looks to improve upon a 16-14 campaign a year ago, as its regular season kicks off on Nov. 7 against Wyoming University. Devin Malast | Long Beach Current<\/p>\n

Women\u2019s hoops returns to the Walter Pyramid this November as Long Beach State looks to climb its way to the top of the Big West ladder after a sixth-place finish last season.<\/p>\n

LBSU head coach Amy Wright<\/a> will embark on her third season at the helm for The Beach in hopes of leading the team past the second round of the Big West Tournament for the first time in her tenure.<\/p>\n

Wright has always prioritized getting shots up quickly, within eight to 12 seconds into the shot clock, resulting in a potent offense that averaged a conference-leading 68.2 points per game.<\/p>\n

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Heading into this season, The Beach will need to replace the production of star senior guard Savannah Tucker, who led the Big West with 16.6 points per game in her final year with the program a year ago. Devin Malast | Long Beach Current<\/p>\n

Despite The Beach averaging 8.8 steals per game, third most in the conference, LBSU struggled defensively last season, allowing the second most points per game in the Big West at 68.7.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe gotta defend a little bit more,\u201d Wright said. \u201cWe didn\u2019t have any problems scoring except for our last game in the Big West Tournament, but other than that, we gotta slow people down.\u201d<\/p>\n

LBSU\u2019s season was ended last year by UC Riverside in the first round of the conference tournament, where the Highlanders limited The Beach to shooting just over 25% from the field.<\/p>\n

Sophomore\u00a0JaQuoia Jones-Brown<\/a> is a rising star point guard for an LBSU team looking to improve this season. <\/p>\n

Earning Big West All-American Freshman Team honors last year, Jones-Brown averaged 7.1 points and 5.4 rebounds per game while shooting 34.7% from beyond the arc.<\/p>\n

Despite being just 5-foot-6, the undersized guard has shown a willingness to compete on the boards, finishing second on the team in rebounding.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the offseason, I\u2019ve been putting in a lot of work with the coaches here and my dad and then just by myself too, just making sure I\u2019m prepared for this upcoming season,\u201d Jones-Brown said.<\/p>\n

Another player to watch this season is\u00a0Kennan Ka<\/a>. The junior forward was selected as a recipient of the Kay Yow Servant Leader award, an honor that student-athletes receive when they demonstrate leadership, service and positive impact off the court.<\/p>\n

Ka has faced numerous challenges in remaining on the court throughout her time with the program, missing the entire 2023-2024 season and playing in just 20 games last year.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m definitely stepping more into a leadership role this year,\u201d Ka said. \u201cI only played half a season last year due to injury, so I\u2019m excited to be out there on the court and not take anything for granted, just being a two-way player and being the leader my team needs.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

After an exhibition match with Point Loma at the Gold Mine on Saturday, Nov. 1, The Beach will begin its season on the road against Wyoming University on the road on Friday, Nov. 7.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Long Beach State women’s basketball looks to improve upon a 16-14 campaign a year ago, as its regular…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":36186,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[131,133,132],"class_list":["post-36185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-long-beach","tag-long-beach","tag-long-beach-headlines","tag-long-beach-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36185","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36185"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36185\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36186"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36185"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36185"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36185"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}