This is a look at the week ahead in women's college basketball. Each week Skim Milkey will be providing five players to keep an eye on, five teams to watch this week, five stats, five games you wouldn't think to keep tabs on, and five tweets.
5 Players I Have My Eye On
Adrianna Smith
Smith is one of the best players in the country that you’ve likely never heard of. The 2022-23 America East Player of the Year is now back for her redshirt senior season after missing all of last year due to injury. Smith averaged 16.4 points and 10.8 rebounds a contest in 2024-25, a year after winning the conference Player of the Year award, and was set up for a huge senior year. Now, it’s finally here, and she’ll look to make her mark early in the first week of the season. Smith posted a gaudy 28.2% defensive rebounding rate and will be a giant boost on the glass this year. She also averaged nearly five assists per game in her last season. Maine takes on Saint Joseph’s in their only game of the week, and a big game in a critical matchup could signify to the rest of the America East that the best player in the conference is back.
Kate Koval
Koval was one of the more discussed transfers of the offseason when she announced she was leaving Notre Dame and subsequently heading to LSU. It was a season of “what-ifs” for Koval, as she was very, very good early in the season but progressively played fewer minutes as the season went on. Through the first two months of the season, Koval was averaging nearly 29 minutes on the floor per game, but once the calendar turned to January, she averaged just 12.8 minutes per game. Koval will have all the opportunity needed to make an impact at LSU this season, and that will start during the first week of the year. LSU hosts Houston Christian, Southeastern Louisiana, and Georgia Southern. Koval doesn’t need to be dominant, but I’m hoping for an efficient week of play that will hopefully snowball into momentum for her as the calendar turns the page this year.
Grace Boffeli
Boffeli is maybe one of the more underrated transfer pickups of the year, seamlessly moving over to a Creighton team that lost seven players to graduation and only returned four players. With a large freshman class, Creighton needed to make sure that they had enough leadership in place to help guide the team. Enter Boffeli, who earned all-conference honors in the Missouri Valley for Northern Iowa in three seasons and was one of the best rebounders in the conference for her career. After suffering a season-ending injury early in the 2024-25 season, Boffeli decided to transfer to Creighton, and on paper, it looks to be a match made in heaven. She’s an excellent offensive rebounder, as in every year of her career she has had above a 10% offensive rebounding rate. With all the shooters that Creighton has, Boffeli will be the beneficiary of quite a few easy assist opportunities. Creighton opens their season with South Dakota State and Drake, where Boffeli should immediately have an impact. South Dakota State gave up the lowest percentage of offensive rebounds in D1 basketball last year, while Drake gave up the fifth lowest number.
Alexia Nelson
Nelson is poised for a breakout season at Saint Louis after her transfer from Towson over the offseason. St. Louis was a team that was extremely senior-laden and saw seven seniors depart. Now, Nelson steps onto a team where she is instantly the top scoring option as the only player who played more than 20 minutes per game on her team. She had a 101% offensive efficiency last year in conference games at Towson and put together a season where she averaged 9.8 points per game and dished off 3.1 assists. She will have to improve on both of those numbers this year while also being more efficient as her usage goes up. The overall success of St. Louis is going to rely on Nelson heavily this year, and with games against strong mid-majors like Missouri State, Middle Tennessee State, and Northern Iowa on the schedule the first six days of the season, we’ll know fairly quickly if Nelson is up to the task.
Bailey Kuhns
After losing six of their top eight minute getters, including three of their top four most impactful players, Robert Morris needed to get someone from the portal who would be able to offset some of that loss. Enter Kuhns—a first-team All-NEC selection last year while helping lead Mercyhurst into their first D1 season. Kuhns scored 19.9 points per game while having the #31 usage rate in college basketball. Kuhns was most efficient offensively last year when her usage was high, but it will not be nearly as high this year with Robert Morris. I am imagining that she’ll only be better as she’s able to get the ball in beneficial spots with better teammates around her and a more defined ‘role.’ That’s no knock on Mercyhurst, as they just moved up from D2, but I’m excited to see her progress now going into her senior year. Kuhns will get her opportunity to prove herself as Robert Morris faces off with UIC and Akron in the first week of action.
5 Teams to Watch This Week
NC State
No team in women’s college basketball starts their season off with a tougher schedule than NC State. They face off with both Tennessee and USC this week, and to go 2-0 out of the gate would be quite the accomplishment and a start to building a strong resume for March. They are a young team who historically does not turn the ball over much, which will help them against the full-court pressure of Tennessee. USC, without Juju Watkins, is a different beast but is still set up for a very tough test. If the Wolfpack can get out of the first week of play 2-0, they should be commended.
Grand Canyon
Molly Miller moves south to Arizona State, and Winston Gandy comes in, taking one of the best mid-major jobs in the country. The biggest change might be the move from the WAC to the Mountain West with the step up in talent that comes with it. Grand Canyon is a retooled roster that is built to win, and it’s a team that I’ll have my eyes on this year. However, during the first week, I’ll have my eyes on them for a different reason. Grand Canyon travels to Columbia, South Carolina, to take on the Gamecocks in the first game of the season. Coach Gandy proves right away that he won’t be ducking the smoke with a trip to take on his previous boss, Dawn Staley, in their first game of the season. They also play Idaho State in the first week, which might be a better barometer to see what this team looks like early in the year.
South Dakota State
South Dakota State lost quite a bit of production from last year but has been one of the very best mid-majors in the country for the last 20 years. With losing so much impact talent, you’d think a coach would schedule a bit easier start to their season, but not Coach Johnston. The Jackrabbits open with Creighton and then welcome in Rice for their second game of the season. Last year, South Dakota State beat these two teams by a combined seven points. I think these first two games will give us an excellent look at a team who is 81-1 in the Summit League over the past five years.
Kent State
Fresh off a 21-12 season, Kent State has much higher expectations for this year. They finished fourth in the MAC last year, but they have plans for more this year. After opening last year with a loss to James Madison, the Golden Flashes never found their footing early as they sat at 6-5 through 11 games. Something clicked for them, and they started to play better basketball the last two-thirds of the year. They have the ability for redemption as they travel to James Madison to open the year, and then they play West Virginia on the road. This is an extremely tough start to the year, but if Kent State can manage to notch a win, it might provide some early momentum in their non-conference slate.
New Mexico
Half of New Mexico’s losses last season came by 10 points or less, and coming into this season, they are likely hoping to be able to flip a few of those games around. They play a tough non-conference schedule, and they would likely want to create some momentum heading into conference play this year. They open up with a tricky three-game set as they host Northern Arizona and North Carolina A&T while traveling to take on Colorado. Anything better than 2-1 in this stretch will be considered a success for their early schedule.
5 Stats to Know
16.3%
This was the 3-point rate for Texas last season, which firmly planted them at #362 in the entire country. They took just over 10 per game last year, and it was a much-discussed topic throughout the season. Texas added a few players to their roster this year with the ability to shoot the ball so that they are not as paint-oriented offensively. I expect both their 3-point rate and their 3-point percentage (30.1% last year) to take a leap forward.
32.9%
West Virginia was the best team in the country last year in forcing turnovers. They forced an opponent to end their possession with a turnover nearly a third of their possessions the entire season. With another year at WVU and more continuity, I expect that the Mountaineers will continue to frustrate offenses into turnovers this season. If they can get this number even higher, West Virginia is going to be a very dangerous team.
37.8%
Ta’Niya Latson had the 2nd highest usage of anyone last year in women’s college basketball, only behind Grace Larkins of South Dakota. She was at Florida State, where she had to touch the ball on nearly every possession and essentially had to put her team on her back most of the year. Now, after transferring to South Carolina, that will be different. South Carolina is one of the top groups in the nation, and they have playmakers all over the floor. I would have expected this number to drop into the 20s and create a much more efficient version of Latson, but with Chloe Kitts being out for the season, Latson might have to take on more of a role than presumed coming in.
1.20
Rachel Ullstrom is one of the most effective and best players in the entire country. The Richmond guard averaged 1.20 points per play last year and was a big reason for the Spiders' success. 1.20 is not the highest mark for her in her career, as in the 2023-24 season she notched a 1.21 points per play rate. With Richmond looking to make some noise this season, it will take another efficient season from Ullstrom to help lead them back to the NCAA tournament.
6.0%
That was the improvement in field goal percentage that Washington showed last year, going from 42.0% in 2023-24 to 48.0% in the 2024-25 season. It’s not unfathomable to see that 48.0 percent stay about the same, as the Huskies brought in some very talented scorers. If Washington wants to make a push for a Top 4 finish in the Big Ten, they’ll have to shoot the ball well once again this season.
5 Games to Monitor
11/3 - North Dakota State @ Northern Iowa
Both of these squads are going to look to get off to a good start to the year. Avery Koenen (North Dakota) and Ryley Goebel (Northern Iowa) are two of the top mid-major players in the country.
11/4 - UT-Arlington @ Houston
A fun matchup here to monitor. The three Reynolds sisters, two of whom transferred into UT-Arlington from Purdue, as well as a highly heralded freshman sister. It's the debut of new Houston head coach Matthew Mitchell.
11/5 - IU-Indy @ Northwestern
IU-Indy was not a good team last year but brought in an influx of talent that should lead them to be a better team. Northwestern is one of the worst teams in the Big Ten. Could we be on upset alert?
11/7 - Utah @ Utah State
Utah and Utah State have only faced each other eight times, and Utah State is 1-1 on their home floor against Utah. This is a fun one solely because I like when an in-state matchup heads to the smaller school.
11/8 - Delaware State @ American
These teams are both going to be horrible, but that's part of the allure to me. I'm all the way in for matchups of 350+ RPI teams.
5 Tweets
