What a week! The final countdown began with our annual Tip Off Club dinner on Tuesday night. It was absolutely amazing what the decorators did with the Ferrell Center. There was plenty of food which in turn meant there was a great crowd. It was good to see all of our loyal Lady Bear fans.
We (the Lady Bears) all enjoyed the personalized centerpieces on each table. Chisa even kept one in her locker! It was very entertaining to meet and greet everyone who attended because its not very often we have the opportunity get to know our fans better! I hope everyone enjoyed the videos we put together, it was all in good fun. Although, Coach Mulkey has informed us she will get the last laugh.
I really can't say enough how much I enjoy playing with and just being around my teammates. We have a lot of fun together in spite how different we may are. On any given night you can find the most random combination of us hanging out. We often joke around that we see each other all day between practice, workouts, or any outside obligations, and yet we still will call each other afterwards to hang out more. I think it really makes a difference on the court that we are so close off the court.
We kind of switched gears on Wednesday during conditioning workouts and played flag football. We went out to the intramural fields across from the Ferrell Center and put our game faces on. It was an intense game from start to finish! Our girls play to win whether its basketball or cards, I mean ruthless. The game ended in a tie but I think it might have been fixed that way. Either way it was a lot of fun and with that we ended our seven week preseason conditioning program.
Saturday could not have come any quicker. It was the day we had been waiting for since we left Norman, Okla., the first day of practice. Friday night we had dinner at the twin's (Steffanie and Tiffanie Blackmon) house and everyone left pretty excited about the next morning. We had a nice little crowd for the first day, which is always good. We ran through our normal routine of locker room, demonstrations and warm-up. We even got to some plays at the end of the break and played half-court. It was a very productive first day, and I think everyone got their nervousness out which is great because we don't have a lot of time for it. Our four newcomers seemed real comfortable with the flow of practice and that always helps. Like Shaun (McPherson, strength and conditioning coach) says, "we hit the court running and were not slowing down." We have a full week ahead of us now so that should be real interesting!
