University of Houston Athletics
Women's Basketball Opens Exhibition Play Sunday
10/28/2006 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Oct. 28, 2006
HOUSTON - The University of Houston women's basketball team opens exhibition play against Lake Truck at 2 p.m. CST, Sunday on Guy V. Lewis Court at Hofheinz Pavilion.
The Cougars return four starters from a squad that was 12-17 (8-8 Conference USA) a year ago. Houston was picked fourth in the C-USA preseason coaches poll earlier this month. The Cougars earned 99 points, including one first-place vote. Rice was tabbed as the preseason favorite with 142 points and 10 first-place votes. Tulsa and SMU tied for second with 113 points each and the Golden Hurricane received one first-place nod. The poll was voted upon by the league's 12 head coaches and released by the league office Wednesday.
Lake Truck is coached by former UH assistant Kevin Cook (1995-97), now an assistant coach for the Houston Comets. The squad is highlighted by former UCLA star Nikki Blue.
Junior Tye Jackson (Houston, Texas/Westfield HS/Purdue), a First Team All C-USA honoree a year ago was named to the league's preseason All-Conference squad. Jackson and Sha'Ratta Hawkins (Houston, Texas/Jesse Jones HS) are the only pair of returning teammates in the league that averaged better then 15 points per game a year ago. Jackson led UH with a 17.7 ppg clip, while Hawkins netted a 15.1 ppg average.
Jackson, an All-America candidate, took part in the team trials for the 2006 U.S. U20 National Team last spring, the only C-USA player to do so. She finished with 30 or more points on two occasions last season with a career-best 37 coming against Rice on Jan. 15.
She also had 35 points at UAB on Feb. 26 and failed to reach double digits in scoring only twice in 22 games while netting eight 20-plus point games. In the UAB contest, Jackson tallied 27 second-half points, including hitting for UH's first 24 of the half. She also dished out 119 assists, ranking second in C-USA with a 5.4 assists per game average.
Two of her season averages, points per game (fourth) and assists per game (second), rank in the top five all time in the UH record book. Jackson had a pair of double-doubles on the season and also had two games with double-digit assists.
Houston opens up the regular season on Nov. 14 at 7 p.m., facing off against Texas Tech at Hofheinz Pavilion. It is the first meeting between the two former Southwest Conference rivals since the 1996 season, which featured three contests, all Texas Tech wins.
The Cougars' early-season schedule borders on brutal, with road trips to Duke, TCU and West Virginia and home games against Texas Tech and Michigan State slotted for the first five matchups of the season.
