The women's hoops team is taking turns writing the blog this season, and sophomore guard Cassandra Brown checks in with the latest entry from Hawai'i. Be sure to bookmark portlandpilots.com/WBBblog and follow the Pilots all season long.
ENTRY #5: Cassandra Brown
Monday, November 21, 2011
GREETINGS PILOT FANS/ALOHA FROM HAWAII! It’s ya girl Cassandra aka CB. Some of you may know me as Sea Biscuit, Cibble, Ceebs or your favourite sophomore guard from the magical land of Canada. Sincere apologies on our blog game over the past couple weeks, it has been a very busy month over here in Pilot country! Don’t you worry your pretty little heads, I am here to catch you up on what we have been up to!
First of all, we started our pre-season off strong with two exhibition wins against Seattle Pacific and Concordia. We defeated the Seattle Pacific Falcons 73-61 (Z scoring a game high 28 points) followed by an 80-36 win over the Concordia Cavaliers. It felt good to get back on the floor and have some fun after two months of hard work in practice and the weight room. Everyone was excited to finally have a game and our energy translated onto the court.
Last week we played Montana State and UC Irvine for our 2011-12 season openers. Unfortunately, some unfriendly rims led us to tough loss against Montana State, but we quickly bounced back to defeat a strong UC Irvine team Sunday afternoon in the Chiles Center (with a game high 25 from Natalie Day). Both games we had strong defensive efforts, leaving our opponents to no more than 55 points.
On a side note, senior forward Natalie Day was named the West Coast Conference Women’s Basketball Player of the Week and became a 1,000 career point scorer last weekend! If you haven’t had a chance to congratulate her yet, you should do so immediately!
Over the past couple weeks the Chiles Center has hosted some exciting events:
LaMarcus Aldridge hosted the Rip City Classic last Sunday in our lovely Chiles Center following our game. Aldridge, Kevin Durant, James Harden, Wesley Matthews, Raymond Felton, Steve Blake, Nate Robinson were some players who took part in the event. Our team was lucky enough to work the game and even meet some of the players!
The Chiles Center also held a wheelchair basketball game, “SamJam 2011” last Tuesday. Our men’s and women’s team came together joined by UP student Sam Bridgman and the Oregon Disability Sports Blazers to raise over $6,000 to combat Friedreich’s Ataxia disease.
We are now in Honolulu (Editor’s note: CB wrote this blog from Hawai’i on Nov. 18, for complete coverage of how the Pilots did at the Rainbow Whine Classic,
click here) ready to take on the University of Hawaii tonight (Friday) at 7 in our first game of the tournament. Saturday, we play top-20 ranked DePaul (12pm) and Sunday we face a strong San Diego State team (3pm). These games will be a good test to see where we are at.
Upon arriving on Wednesday, we have managed to squeeze in some free-time for a Team Luau! We feasted on Hawaiian food, learned how to hula dance and even had a live concert on our bus ride back while our Luau leader serenaded us sweet lullabies allllll the way back to the hotel. The highlight of the night though was most definitely our athletic trainer, Sir Alex, stealing the show.
Until next time Pilot Fans! Stay purple, stay humble. GO PILOTS!
PREVIOUS ENTRIES
• Entry #1: Sarah Griffin (Sept. 19, 2011)
• Entry #2: Amy Pupa (Sept. 30, 2011)
• Entry #3: Colleen Olinger (Oct. 4, 2011)
• Entry #4: ReZina TecleMariam (Oct. 24, 2011)
