Lady Bison coach Frank Bennett and his staff signed three new players last week, forward O’Neisha Smith, center Jessica Reece and guard Haley Nelson.
Smith, a 5’11 forward out of Georgia is described as a defensive player who can finish underneath the basket and grab rebounds. She is from the same high school as Lipscomb men’s basketball player Brandon Barnes. In high school Smith was the captain of her team, and was twice selected to the All-Region team.
Smith has also competed in the high jump in high school, reaching 5-foot-6 in 2009. She plans to also compete on the track team for the Lady Bisons.
“O’Neisha is a very good athlete,” Bennett said. “She was state runner up the last two years in the high jump, and hopes to jump 5-8 or more this year.”
“She is developing her skills as a player,” Bennett said of her basketball skills. “She is a left-hander, more of a rebounder or a slasher, or someone that can finish and gets fouled a lot. She adds a lot of quickness and jumping ability that will help us.
“In her high school career the team progressed each year, eventually reaching the state tournament in 5A,” Bennett said. “Her team had a lot of firsts during her career.
“With her athletic ability we feel that she has a chance to make a lot of improvement when it comes to working on her shooting technique and little things to help her with her game. I feel that she is the type that is very coachable and will develop quickly.”
Jessica Reece, a 6-3 center from Fletcher, N.C., was a late signee.
“We were fortunate to get her,” Bennett said. “We found out about her fairly late when we heard that she had not committed yet. When we saw her play she was a great fit for what we were looking for, and Lipscomb offered everything that she was looking for.”
With Claire Waggener leaving the team, Reece will likely fill the role of a big presence inside the lane along with her teammates Brittany Duerk and Chelsea McMeans.
“When we saw her on tape the thing that impressed us the most was that she ran the floor well,” Bennett said of the 6-3 Reece. “She beat the other post players down, and showed really good hands which is another key thing for post players.
“We really feel that she has a lot of potential to get down the floor and score some for us.
“She is a little weak, particularly her upper body,” Bennett said.
“Getting stronger will be a big thing, along with working on her post game. The girls she will be facing in college are bigger, stronger players than she’s used to. We feel like the fact that she can run and catch is a great starting point, and she seems very coachable. Because of that, she should develop into a great athlete.”
The Lady Bisons also added 5-5 point guard Haley Nelson to the roster.
“We feel that she is skilled enough and quick enough to make up for her height,” Bennett said.
Nelson, a 1,500-point scorer in high school, will look to continue her success at the Division-I level.
“When all three of us [coaches] saw her, we left saying that she was an exceptional passer,” Bennett said. “Haley really delivers the ball crisply and right on target at the right time.”
Nelson can not only pass, she can also shoot the ball exceedingly well. That showed her senior season when she averaged 16.8 points per game.
“She has also been a good scorer, averaging 38 percent three-point shooter,” Bennett said. “She averaged 16 or 17 points a game, with a pretty good medium range pull-up jumper.
“She can also finish pretty well at the basket for someone her size,” Bennett said. “We lost a point guard in Toia McGowan, and we have two other girls on the team that play point extensively for us in Mica Bowman and Jenna Barstokas, so we will have a need at point guard both this year and next year.”
Bennett says he is excited to see what happens in the offseason.
“There will be a lot of competition, and we are a young team,” Bennet said. “We are getting a bulk of our minutes played back, and the new girls definitely have a chance to compete.”
“We will see how the new additions develop, and the how the team itself develops over the summer. There will be a lot of competition for spots, giving us something that we have not had before.”
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