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Women’s Basketball

Spiders pick up a grad transfer from Penn State.

Know this one well. She played HS with my daughter. Won a state championship together when Anna was a sophomore. Anna went on to win another State Championship and finish 2nd in her Junior and Senior years. She played a lot at Penn State (including 50+ starts I think) her first three years but not as much this last year. She is a sorta stretch big, but never really got her shooting going in college in the Big 10. But she was a multi-year Captain at PSU, great kid, and also a big NIL woman. She did a lot of social media and cashed in that too through NIL. Not sure what she will find at UR on that front. On the court she will help I think and if she can rediscover her shooting, she can be pretty impactful for UR!
 
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Know this one well. She played HS with my daughter. Won a state championship together when Anna was a sophomore. Anna went on to win another State Championship and finish 2nd in her Junior and Senior years. She played a lot at Penn State (including 50+ starts I think) her first three years but not as much this last year. She is a sorta stretch big, but never really got her shooting going in college in the Big 10. But she was a multi-year Captain at PSU, great kid, and also a big NIL woman. She did a lot of social media and cashed in that too through NIL. Not sure what she will find at UR on that front. On the court she will help I think and if she can rediscover her shooting, she can be pretty impactful for UR!

Roussell seems to be hooked on these types of players. 3 of our better ball handlers (out of 4) transferred out. All we have are 6’1” to 6’3” players. I fear that if the team gets pressed they’ll fold pretty easily.
 
3 of 4? Boone, Burgos, and who? Williams was not a ball handler.

Burgos was pretty much a non-factor...played 78 minutes all season. I honestly didn't expect her to play a fifth year anyway.

I agree Boone is a loss, but we've got a frosh coming in to back up Townsend.

Believe we also still have two open spots, though I don't know if we plan to use both. We had an open one this year. But I assume we're still looking at the portal.
 
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Very early for this, considering she is only class of 2026, but I was told recently at a local HS game by someone who would know, that Sanai Green (previously mentioned) is a quiet commit to Richmond.

She is only a FR, so there is a long, long way to go. She is considered by many to be the #1 or #2 in VA and a top 25 overall recruit in the class of 2026. She was Steward’s best player last year as an 8th grader. She would be a huge pick up for coach Roussell.

UR was the first to offer her in 7/8th grade. She has since been offered by too schools many to count/list (VT, UVA, Ohio St, Kentucky, etc). But it sounds like she wants to stay somewhat local. UR is also recruiting her teammate Ella Grace Saunders (also class of 2026).

I know her coach, Kara, at Steward from various local girls basketball circles. She was a Grad Assistant at Richmond, under Michael Shafer, while she was getting her masters in sports management from VCU (part of her degree requirement). I know she thinks very highly of coach Roussell and his program, as do many of the local HS coaches.
Vol, you heard anything more about Green? Still early in her recruitment, but as one of the top few recruits in VA for 2026, she's picking up huge offers left and right. Baylor, Pitt, Illinois, Louisville, Ole Miss, UNC, and Iowa in just the past couple of days. Lots of others too since your post.

Hard to imagine she would stick with UR when she'll have her choice of any school in the country.
 
Vol, you heard anything more about Green? Still early in her recruitment, but as one of the top few recruits in VA for 2026, she's picking up huge offers left and right. Baylor, Pitt, Illinois, Louisville, Ole Miss, UNC, and Iowa in just the past couple of days. Lots of others too since your post.

Hard to imagine she would stick with UR when she'll have her choice of any school in the country.
Now the shade has found its way to the women’s program.
 
Now the shade has found its way to the women’s program.
Shade? I think Roussell is doing a solid job rebuilding the program and I'm rooting all the way for Sanai to be a Spider, but I'm also being realistic.

It would be incredible if she decided to stay home, but when just about every program including the national runners-up are already banging down her door, the odds are undoubtedly stacked against UR.
 
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A long way to go before all these decisions are made, but staying at home wouldn't be unprecedented. The example that came to mind was Elena Della Donne. She originally committed to UConn but dropped out and landed at Delaware. There were some unique circumstances in her case, but the pull of home can be powerful.
 
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But when its a local kid - boy or girl, you recruit them early, hard, and often. Try to use that local connection as much as possible, and sometimes you get lucky - maybe they commit early before they blow up AND honor the commitment. OR - maybe they just really want to stay home. And now with transfer portal - maybe they go elsewhere and don't like it or come home towards the end of their college career. So many more possibilities that is basically impossible to give up on someone now and just say - we can't recruit them.
 
A long way to go before all these decisions are made, but staying at home wouldn't be unprecedented. The example that came to mind was Elena Della Donne. She originally committed to UConn but dropped out and landed at Delaware. There were some unique circumstances in her case, but the pull of home can be powerful.
That's being polite. There was a lot more to it than her handicapped sibling.
 
A long way to go before all these decisions are made, but staying at home wouldn't be unprecedented. The example that came to mind was Elena Della Donne. She originally committed to UConn but dropped out and landed at Delaware. There were some unique circumstances in her case, but the pull of home can be powerful.
She also was extremely homesick and had a special needs sister she missed. Staying home didn’t hurt her but she’s an exceptional talent.
 
Couple of offers on the women's side tonight: 2025 Zaniah Zellous out of WV and 2026 Syvannah Dawson out of Thomas Dale.



 
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Not sure if this was already in the works or if Roussell moved quickly after Camden's injury, but we've added another grad transfer forward, Faye Parker out of Penn. Limited contributor there, but Roussell says he recruited her heavily out of Tabor Academy. She had a career-high 7 boards plus 4 points and 3 blocks against the Spiders when we played Penn in the WNIT this past season.

 
UR press release on Camden's injury...out for the season of course. Not exactly clear whether she'll plan to stick around for another season with the medical redshirt, but seems like it could be a possibility.

 
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UR press release on Camden's injury...out for the season of course. Not exactly clear whether she'll plan to stick around for another season with the medical redshirt, but seems like it could be a possibility.

Get her in a good MA program that takes two years.
 
I guess that means Studer is sliding in as an assistant. Johnson moved on after only a year and is now at Towson…not sure why she made the move.
 
Roussell offered 2025 CG Rayne Wright out of Midlothian. NC A&T and Campbell were her first two offers.

 
Update after 3 games - Got beat down by Duke at Cameron (not unexpected, and they actually improved over last year's point spread). Looked really good against Delaware St (a team near the bottom of the women's RPI) and just beat Gardner-Webb by over 20 points. They're crushing the teams they should crush, and they're shooting really really well. Their new small guard Van Arsdale is a good complement to Grace in the backcourt. They're tenacious and fast. Looking forward to the future.
 
Maine got off to a 3–1 start including an 11-point victory over A-10 favorite Rhode Island, but the Spiders just demolished the Black Bears, 77–43. Spiders are playing well in all phases of the game, shooting well, defending well, rebounding well, taking care of the ball.

They got easily handled by Duke in the opener, but since then it's been utter domination by the Spiders.

Drake tomorrow should be a tough test, and Louisiana Tech probably won't be a pushover, so it'll be interesting to see what the Spiders can do over the next two days.
 
Spiders are in position to sweep the Drake event...crushing La Tech 45–20 at halftime after another huge second quarter where they outscored the Lady Techsters 20–3.
 
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Spiders are in position to sweep the Drake event...crushing La Tech 45–20 at halftime after another huge second quarter where they outscored the Lady Techsters 20–3.
This is great, I have a hard time imagining it, since I always see the 80s version of LA Tech…
 
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Spiders run them out of the gym, 83–56. Doogan with 21, Ullstrom with 15 off the bench, Budnik with 12. Spiders shoot over 50% from the floor overall and from deep.

Big game on Thursday against Villanova, where Spider frosh Courtney Swider will face her senior sister Kylie. (Their brother Cole was on a two-way contract with the Lakers last season and is now on one with the Heat.)

 
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