After a bit of a disappointing season last year, Delaware will try to reach the 10 CAA win plateau yet again. Do they have the talent to do so?
Entering the new decade and the 2020-21 season, Delaware head coach Natasha Adair will face some of the greatest challenges she’s ever faced in her short, four-year tenure so far.
Not only will she have to coach the Blue Hens through a messy season sure to be disrupted by COVID-19, but she’ll also have to work with a depleted roster as she tries to hit that mark that’s been the talk of her tenure so far: 10 conference wins or more.
Since 2017-18 — Adair’s first and finest year as coach, in which the Blue Hens finished with their best record in years, fourth in the Colonial Athletic Association (11-7 CAA, 19-13 overall) — Delaware has twice finished with 10 conference wins or more, hitting that mark in both 2017-18 and 2018-19.
While that 10-win mark might not seem too remarkable for women’s basketball programs like James Madison or Drexel — which have both been consistent high-achievers — it was an incredible turnaround for Delaware, which hadn’t finished with 10 or more conference wins since 2012-13, four seasons before the 2017-18 breakthrough.
In fact, just before 2012-13, Delaware had seen some of its best years ever in school history under former head coach Tina Martin (now an assistant coach at UNC Wilmington): In both 2011-12 and 2012–13, the unstoppable Blue Hens, led by future WNBA MVP Elena Della-Donne, went undefeated (18-0) in conference play, won the CAA Championship and qualified for the NCAA Tournament, where they went on runs both years.
In 2011–12, the Blue Hens finished 31-2 overall (and 18-0 in CAA play). And in 2012-13, Delaware’s last huge year of success under Martin, the Blue Hens finished 32-4 overall (and 18-0 in CAA play again).
The early 2010s were the golden years for the Blue Hens, the newly crowned two-time CAA champions. By contrast, the middle and late 2010s were a decline from which Delaware is still recovering.
Although the Blue Hens have finished above their 10-win mark twice over the course of these past three years, they’ve slipped year after year since their breakout season in 2017-18 and since Adair became head coach May 14, 2017.
In 2018-19, the Blue Hens finished fifth in the conference (11-7 CAA, 16-5 overall), falling from fourth place in 2017-18.
And in 2019-20 (last season), which was cut short because of the pandemic, the Blue Hens finished down in the seventh place (8-10 CAA, 12-17 overall), falling below .500 in both conference play (.444) and overall play (.414) and well below their new mark of 10 conference victories.
I’m not necessarily blaming Adair for that decline — I’m simply stating the facts and saying she’s aware of it, making plans for it and preparing to deal with it as we enter next season.
With shattered hopes and lowered expectations, Delaware witnessed an unceremonious and unsuccessful end to last season as they fell two victories shy of 10 conference wins and as the CAA Tournament was abruptly canceled Thursday, March 12.
While I’m extremely doubtful that the sixth-seeded Blue Hens would’ve beaten our College (21-8, 12-6 CAA), the No. 3 seed, in the CAA Quarterfinals that evening with Eva Hodgson on the court, I’m sure Delaware was disappointed to have lost the chance to compete. I for one was sure disappointed to have lost the opportunity to watch that game.
Given Delaware’s downward trajectory these past few seasons, following 2017–18, I’m not confident the Blue Hens will win more than 10 CAA games this season, either.
And after what an unfortunate finish Delaware had last season in particular, I think Delaware may only win a dozen games overall (again) and will finish either sixth or below in the CAA.
It’s not going to be a good year for the Blue Hens, though I’m sure they’ll at least do better than UNCW (whose struggles I documented in my 2020–21 Season Preview) and Hofstra (whose epic collapse last season Brendan recapped in his 2020-21 Season Preview).
The biggest downside I see for Delaware going into this season is its loss of talented seniors from last season and the lack of talent, leadership and experience among the Blue Hens.
Plus, of the Delaware players remaining, I’m not sure who will opt in or who will stay because of COVID-19 concerns. Glancing at Delaware’s News page under women’s basketball, I don’t see any mention of players opting out because of the coronavirus — unlike Tribe Athletics’ website, where I see news of Hodgson and Libby Underwood opting out.
Regardless, between 2019-20 and now, four Delaware seniors — and one graduate student — have all graduated, leaving Delaware with a huge, five-player hole in its roster this season.
Seniors Abby Gonzales, Samone DeFreese, Bailey Kargo and Rebecca Lawrence are all gone, and so is Nicole Enabosi, the master’s student in question. Together, Delaware’s five team captains have all finished their studies, taken their degrees and left the Blue Hens behind.
But of these five huge names, I’m looking at the loss of Enabosi, DeFreese and Gonzales in particular. Their graduation and departure is especially devastating for Delaware this season.
To start with Enabosi, she was one of the greatest players Delaware ever signed — no joke.
Not only was Enabosi the 2017-18 CAA Player of the Year, All-CAA First Team and CAA All-Defensive Team, but she also ended her career within Delaware’s top 25 of 16 different statistical categories, including being first in school history in rebounds, double-doubles, and field goal percentage, and second in points and free throws made. Indeed, she played a ton over her career – ranking 11th all-time among Blue Hens, with 3,641 minutes on the court (or roughly 60.68 hours of hoop).
Plus, Enabosi was extremely strong coming back from an ACL tear that required surgery and kept her off the court for her entire senior year (2018-19).
Before Enabosi’s injury — in 2017-18, when Delaware was at its strongest under Adair — Enabosi averaged a double-double per contest: 18 points, 11.8 rebounds and 2.3 assists in an average of 34.8 minutes per game.
Starting all 32 games — 30 of which she tallied double-doubles — she also shot 50.8 percent (202-of-398) from the field and 70.7 percent (171-of-242) from the free throw line.
With numbers like those, she obviously earned the right to each of those three postseason honors from the CAA, which were made all the more meaningful to her when she suffered a season-ending ACL tear during tryouts with the Nigerian National Team in July 2018.
When Enabosi returned from that injury last season (2019-20) after a year-long recovery, it was clearly special for her, and she was special playing for Delaware once again, averaging 17.1 points, 8.4 rebounds and 2.1 assists in 31.7 minutes per game. She also shot a slightly improved 53.2 percent (151-of-284) from the field and a slightly diminished 67.6 percent (125-of-185) from the foul line.
Now, with Enabosi gone, the Blue Hens have lost their star forward from Gathersburg, Md. — a 6-foot-1 warrior and walking double-double, playing with grit, drive and stamina.
However, in addition to Enabosi being gone, the Blue Hens have also lost Gonzales — their “floor general,” according to Adair — and DeFreese, both of whom played high minutes for Delaware last season.
On the court for average of 30.9 minutes per game, Gonzales — a 5-foot-7 guard from Wexford, Pa. — averaged eight points, 2.7 rebounds and three assists per game. She also led Delaware for the third-straight year in total assists (87) and for the second-straight year in three-point field goals made (44), shooting 35.2 percent (83-of-236) from the field and 29.1 percent (44-of-151) from three.
And meanwhile, DeFreese — a 6-foot forward from Bergenfield, N.J. — averaged 8.6 points, 5.9 rebounds and 1.6 assists in 26.9 minutes per game. She shot a solid 43.3 percent (93-of-215) from the field, including a career-high, 30.2 percent (19-of-63) from three.
With the loss of its talented seniors, Delaware now has for its senior squad, Tee Johnson and Lizzie Oleary, both of whom are bench players and career three-, four-point scorers. Neither has started more than 15 games a season — Oleary started 12 games last season and Johnson started four — and neither has averaged more than 20 minutes per game, so both likely will require some coaching and development from Adair if they’re to play more minutes for Delaware.
Most likely, leadership at the Blue Hens this season will turn to Jasmine Dickey, Delaware’s promising junior guard/forward from Baltimore who was was named Preseason All-CAA First Team. Dickey’s the player Delaware has to look forward to this season now that last year’s talented senior class has graduated.
A five-time CAA Rookie of the Week her freshman year (2018-19) and a member of the CAA All-Rookie Team, Dickey made great strides her sophomore year (2019-20), in which she won Team MVP and Team Most Improved Player and earned a spot on the All-CAA Second Team and the CAA All-Defensive Team.
Between 2018-19 and 2019-20, Dickey went from averaging 7.9 points and 8.3 rebounds per game in 25.7 minutes to averaging 12.4 points and 9.2 rebounds in 32.6 minutes, in what was an incredibly promising leap for her.
Plus, during that time, Dickey’s shooting improved as well. In 2018-19, she shot 34 percent (69-of-203) from the field and 60.3 percent (44-of-73) from the line. Last season, she shot 38 percent (148-of-389) from the field and 69.3 percent (61-of-88) from the line.
She also started all but one game last season, having 28 starts out of 29 games played, in contrast to her freshman year, when she started only 14 games out of the 23 she played.
Assuming Dickey improves and takes another leap forward this year, Delaware might have a shot at hitting 10 conference wins and finishing above seventh place in the CAA. That’d be an ideal finish for the Blue Hens after they’ve struggled and declined these past two seasons.
However, I’m doubtful that dream finish will happen because of how depleted the Blue Hens are of talented seniors.
The only surprise Delaware could have (besides Dickey) that could help the Blue Hens win this season and could prove me wrong are the four freshmen coming in, a series of guards ranging in height from 5-foot-5 to 5-foot-9: Tyi Skinner, Tara Cousins, Mar Tejedor and Jadaia Reid.
From their high school bios, they all sound talented on paper, so we’ll have to see how they actually perform once the season begins.
And luckily for Adair and the Blue Hens, our Tribe’s not going to be as much of threat this year with Hodgson sitting out, so Delaware may rise a bit in the CAA if our College slips.
That said, I still think it’s going to be a tough season ahead for Delaware. Unless Adair really coaches Dickey, these two seniors and this freshman squad into shape, expect the Blue Hens to finish in the bottom half of the CAA again.