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Sunday, October 17, 1999
Isles waste no time in returning to practice court
By Mark Zuckerman
Caller-Times
The hoopla of their first Midnight Madness still fresh in their minds, the Texas A&M-Corpus Christi basketball teams wasted little time getting down to business.
Both the men's and women's squads held practice Saturday morning, with the men back on the court at 9 a.m. sharp for their first real full-team workout.
"We have to split court-time with the women, so I'd just as soon get it over with," said Islanders men's coach Ronnie Arrow of the early-morning practice at the campus field house. "They can all sleep (Saturday afternoon) and then come back (today) at 1."
Any indication of a lack of sleep on the Islanders' part was disguised Saturday by an up-tempo 21/2-hour workout that left the coaching staff pleased and the players ready for a nap.
"We didn't get any rest, and then we had to come back out in the morning," said junior forward Michael Hicks. "But I was just ready to practice. As soon as we stopped doing the running and conditioning, I just wanted to practice."
As was to be expected, A&M-Corpus Christi looked a little out of sync Saturday, needing some extra instruction on a few drills, but Arrow was impressed nonetheless.
"The first day is going through mostly learning the drills," the coach said. "But the effort was there, and I think that's 90 percent of it. They got home late last night, came back here today and got after it."
With an emphasis on precision-passing drills, the Islanders focused on building team chemsitry and awareness on the court, which Arrow hopes his players will develop in time for their first exhibition game in three weeks.
"They actually know each other a hell of a lot more than the coaches do," Arrow said, "because they were able to see each other for the last month playing (pickup games). But we're getting a pretty good idea."
"Our timing was off, because we're still a new team," said junior forward Aaron Eneas. "So it's going to take a little while before everybody's timing is together. But for the first day, we looked pretty good."
Following the conclusion of the men's practice, the Islander women's team began its first full-squad workout. And like the men, head women's coach Sheryl Estes spent a good amount of time working on passing, defense and anything else that might help promote cohesion among players.
"I'm really happy to get started with our first practice," Estes said. "This is really the beginning for us, getting prepared for our first game."
The Islanders emerged from the workout with spirits high.
"We really didn't know what to expect, because we'd never been on the floor together in a real practice," said freshman Keisha Cornelius. "That makes it a little tough. But I think we expect a lot out of ourselves."
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