UTC women’s head basketball coach Jim Foster directs players during the Lady Mocs’ basketball practice and their Mocs Club Basketball Open House event Oct. 29, 2014, in Chattanooga.For the second consecutive year, the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga women’s basketball team will be the nightcap of a season-opening doubleheader with the Mocs men’s team, as the women again host a team from a power conference.
Beyond that, almost everything else is different for Jim Foster’s team, as the Hall of Fame coach begins his second season in Chattanooga.
The defending Southern Conference champions begin play tonight against Villanova with a revamped lineup facing a massively upgraded schedule that includes games against 2014 Women’s Final Four participants Notre Dame and Stanford as well as other tough tests against Tennessee, Butler and South Florida.
“What (former UTC coach) Wes (Moore) did here is phenomenal, so the only thing we could really do is just tweak it to up the schedule a little bit,” Foster said at Tuesday’s media luncheon. “Now, your players have to stay tough because you’re putting them in environments and against teams where we’re going from playing the bottom of (other leagues) to playing league champions. Tennessee, Notre Dame and Stanford won the SEC, the ACC and the Pac-12 last year.”
Redshirt senior Destiny Bramblett will be back to help fellow senior Ka’Vonne Towns lead the Mocs after Bramblett took last season off recovering from ankle surgery and was sidelined for several weeks this summer after breaking her other ankle.