Temple women hungry for Atlantic 10 title

The Temple women's basketball team will begin its season Friday at the Liacouras Center, hosting No. 7 ranked Ohio State. Leading the Owls into the game will be third-year head coach Tonya Cardoza.

Cardoza, who instituted a new system when she arrived two seasons ago, has been able to keep the momentum going at Temple.

"I credit my assistant coaches for being on board with everything that I've tried to do, and our players just buying into the system," said Cardoza, who is 46-19 at Temple. "It was a totally different system and it took them a little while but once they realized that they were having success with it they bought into it."

Cardoza's Owls finished last season 25-9 overall and qualified for their seventh consecutive NCAA Tournament, making it to the second round as the eighth seed before losing to perennial powerhouse UConn.

The Owls have not won an Atlantic 10 title since 2006 and are hungry for one this season after just missing out last season with a loss to No. 5 Xavier in overtime in the title game.

"I think if you ask any coach, their expectation is to go out and try to put yourself in a position to win the conference, and then try to win the A-10 Tournament," Cardoza said.

Along with an A-10 title, Cardoza has another goal she'd like to accomplish this season.

"[My goal is] to improve every day during practice; give ourselves a chance to win every game that we play and just to improve on all the things that we weren't that good at last year," she said.

Cardoza hopes her new cast of Owls will be able to step up and replace key players who graduated after the 2009-10 season.

"I think, with the players that we lost last year, three guys that could play defense," Cardoza said. "LaKeisha Eaddy was able to force a lot of turnovers from the other teams, and I knew that every single day that Jasmine [Stone] could go out and get double-figure rebounds.

"So that's something that I'm a little wary about; who is going to be that post presence that will go in and try to get every rebound that comes off, and right now we haven't identified that person."

Looking at the players she does have, junior Kristen McCarthy averaged a team-high 14.8 points per game last season. She also earned an A-10 first-team selection.

Cardoza also expects Qwedia Wallace, Shey Peddy and BJ Williams to step up and fill important roles on this year's team.

"It's always important for your guards to be leaders and to direct what's going on because those guys are the ones with the ball all the time and they're the ones that have the direct line to the coach," Cardoza said. "So it's important for all four of those guys to be very vocal and I think right now they have done that."

The Owls' schedule is also a difficult one this year, but Cardoza believes that no one game is more important than another. Her goal is just go out and try to win every single game and hope for the best. *