The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunmedia.net

The women’s national basketball team will be travelling without one or two key components, but head coach Yolett McPhee-McCuin is still confident that they will do very well.

McPhee-McCuin, the head coach at Jacksonville University, was in town to supervise the final week of training for the national team before they leave Saturday for Tortola, British Virgin Islands, for the Caribbean Basketball Championships. The team is the first in a series of teams that the Bahamas Basketball Federation will be sending off this summer.

Right on the heels of the ladies’ tournament, the men’s team - now coached by Mario Bowleg - will be heading to Tortola to defend their title at the CBC tournament June 14-21.

Both teams are currently training at the Kendal Isaacs Gymnasium.

“Right now, we have a lot of work to do,” said McPhee-McCuin, who will be assisted on the trip by coaches Donnie Culmer and Varel Clarke-Davis.

“Right now, the girls are positive and they are willing to learn and work at the same time. We are in the process of completing the team selection and once we do that, we will be in a position to fine tune the team and get everybody to understand their role on the team.”

Three players, who played a role in the success of the team last year, will be returning but combining a lot of inexperienced players in the mix this year, McPhee-McCuin said it will a team she can work on developing for the future.

However, McPhee-McCuin said their line-up will be shortened with the absence of 6-foot-4 forward Jonquel Jones, who is currently nursing an injury after having an exceptional season this year with the George Washington Colonials.

Also absent will be 6-2 forward Leashja Grant, who signed a national letter of intent to play for the Texas Tech University Red Raiders this year after she starred for the Trinity Valley Community College Cardinals, averaging a double double with 12.1 points and 12.9 rebounds per game.

Her sophomore and final season with the Trinity Valley Community College Cardinals, Grant averaged a double double with 12.1 points and 12.9 rebounds per game. She is another player McPhee-McCuin was hoping to include in her line-up.

“Without them, we just lost 27 points,” McPhee-McCuin said.

“So we have to find away to make up those 27 points.”

How will they do it?

“We have some young legs on this team so we are going to have to do it on the defensive end and try to force a lot of turnovers and eventually get to run the ball on the fast break,” she said. “We will have a balanced team, so hopefully we can represent the Bahamas just like we did last year.”

Last year, McPhee-McCuin guided the team to an historic performance in Tortola where they only lost one game and that came in their quest to advance in the playoffs.