Elgin CC women will rely on defense

Veteran Elgin Community College women's basketball coach Jerry McLaughlin is a stickler for the little things in the game.

The Spartans' longtime boss is pleased with the defensive potential of this year's group, but stresses ECC must improve its foul shooting going forward.

"We will rely on our defense," he said. "Right now, our free-throw shooting is not good and we must be more consistent with our game shots and our layups. We'll look to use our presses on defense to create offense. The free-throw shooting has to become consistent. We just shot 10-for-25 in a game, which is not good. We shoot for 70 percent each year as a team."

McLaughlin, whose team was off to a 3-1 start after four games with wins over Carl Sandburg, Harper and the Judson JV, has been impressed with the team's improvement on the boards as well as its togetherness.

"We've worked hard at boxing out. The rebounding is getting better," he said. "Our team chemistry also is good."

ECC returns 4 players from a 2013-2014 team that went 16-14 and took fourth in the Illinois Skyway Collegiate Conference. ECC lost in the last seconds to Sandburg in the Region IV quarterfinals.

Back for the Spartans are sophomore all-conference performer Jen Dumoulin (5-4, forward, Hampshire), as well as Jordan Bartelt (5-5, guard, Dundee-Crown), Erika Haynes (5-9, guard, Bartlett), Jackie Bartolai (5-10, center, Jacobs) and Porsche Griggs (6-0, center, Westminster Christian).

Newcomers to the team include freshmen Leah Nicolini (5-4, guard, South Elgin), Hannah Diteveaux (5-9, forward, Hampshire), Becky Dumoulin (5-8, forward, Hampshire) and Clarissa Ramos (5-10, F, St. Edward).

McLaughlin has been impressed with the play of Griggs thus far, and noted Bartelt has been a consistent presence on the floor, while Ramos has been a constant on the scoresheet thus far and Becky Dumoulin will help the team on the perimeter with her shooting. Bartelt and Jen Dumoulin are the team co-captains this season.

"We're getting better with our turnovers and we're stressing boxing out and rebounding to take away those second- and third-shot opportunities for our opponents," said McLaughlin. "The big thing is the free-throw shooting has to change. The last two games we were 10 of 25 and 15 of 30. Each player has to take that as an individual goal."

ECC is heading to Jacksonville, Fla., Wednesday and will play a pair of NJCAA Division I teams while it is in the Sunshine State.

"This is an important trip for us," said McLaughlin. "We'll see a couple of teams that are very athletic. If we can play with them we should be able to come back here and be very competitive with the teams in our conference. This is going to be a learning experience that will further help with team chemistry. The more we continue to gel on and off the court, the stronger a team will be."

After playing in Florida, ECC has an equally challenging slate next week with games against Kishwaukee, Wright and Madison.

"Those are some key games for us," said McLaughlin.