It may be time to take Goldie Gopher out behind the building and shoot her.  Just put her out of her misery. Coach Cheryl Littlejohn said her team made progress this year but it was "hidden progress." That's good, because there wasn't much progress apparent on the court.

The players appear to have bought into Littlejohn's system and they play hard for her, but the Gophers have always played hard. At times they were decent defensively, but they were not a good rebounding team. Offensively, the strategy seemed to be to pass the ball around the perimeter until inspiration struck. Freshman three-point specialist Cassie VanderHeyden has the ability to have a hot streak and keep her team in the game, but no one else on the team could score consistently.  The Gophs ended up averaging almost ten points a game less than any other team in the conference.  In fact no one on the team averaged in double figures last year. 

After her first season, Littlejohn ran off about half of her team and replaced them with "her" kind of players. As a group, "her" players were not as good as the ones they replaced. This was simply a team that did not have enough talent, either on the court or on the bench, to compete in the Big 10.

 

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