At 5-2, SUNY Oneonta’s women’s basketball team has started another season well, with the chance of being a contender in the State University of New York Athletic Conference.

Ever since coach Daphne Thompson was hired in 2007, the Red Dragons have had seasons of at least 10 SUNYAC wins and a winning percentage of .500 or better. In Thompson’s first seven years the Red Dragons have won the SUNYAC tournament once (2011-12) and made one NCAA Tournament appearance; but, they haven’t had the consistent top-level success that Thompson and her team desire.

“I mean, I was really disappointed,” Thompson said. “We had a great season [last year], but we lost in the first round of our conference tournament at home, and that was the second year in a row doing that.”

The team went 18-8 overall and 12-6 in the SUNYAC last season and 13-13 (10-8) the year before, which was the lowest amount of overall and conference wins since Thompson’s tenure began. 

She is bound to have quite high expectations — although she says she has tempered them over the years — given her successful career as a four-year varsity player and senior captain for University of Delaware’s Division I Blue Hens. Thompson was also a standout high school player at Morris Central School in Morris, N.Y., near Oneonta. She was a player of the year while at Morris and was inducted into the New York State Section 4 Hall of Fame earlier this year.

“I think commitment is important, and that may be something that I kind of brought with me [from my Division I experience],” Thompson said.

Thompson has also focused on preserving the academic standards that are not only requisite for Oneonta admission but also for athletic participation.

“I was fortunate to play for a woman who was all about academics and that isn’t always the case. … What she taught me was the values that Division III embodies, I think that’s kind of the direction that I took,” Thompson said.

And the Red Dragons’ coach doesn’t stop there — she wants her players to have a well-balanced and holistic college experience that allows them to be the best people they can be and “successful, strong [women] in society.”

The basketball part of that complete experience requires the same amount of commitment and work that any other aspect does, and so in pushing her players to be successful in basketball players, Thompson is teaching them how to be successful people. Her goals (while secretly number-driven as we all know coaches’ goals to be) reflect her humanistic approach to the game and to her team.

“I think for me, it’s trying to really grow them into complete players as much as I can this year,” she said, “knowing that I have the majority of them back, [and] helping them to see success — to kind of sustain that through another year [and] finish stronger than we did last year.”

Oneonta could certainly be on its way given that it is one of two teams in the SUNYAC with a winning overall record. The Red Dragons are also led by an experienced and towering center in 6-3 senior Sarah Longto. Longto is averaging 11.4 points, 7.7 rebounds and 2.2 blocks per game. Her backcourt counterpart, junior Caysea Cohen, who is playing in her first season, is the dynamic combo guard leading the Red Dragons in scoring at 13.3 points per game.

They also have had a distinct advantage on the boards, outrebounding their opponents by an 8.4 margin per game so far this season. Longto is certainly a major reason for the edge, but the Red Dragons have four other players, three of whom are guards (including Cohen), who are averaging more than four rebounds per game.

“One of the things that I’ve always tried to do in the recruiting process is to recruit a versatile team,” Thompson said. “Our conference is so different from top to bottom in the personnel that they have, and so what I’ve tried to do is to find players and build a program that is capable of playing against any of those styles of play.”

Dominant rebounding and high energy, which Thompson said Cohen has an endless amount of, are two attributes that are effective no matter the opponent or the stakes of the game. Every coach and every team would love to have a pure shooter, a skilled big and a pass-first point guard who orchestrates the offense and defense, but often those model players aren’t available or don’t exist. What can transcend those ideal roles is good fundamental basketball and a strong will. 

Thompson and her Red Dragons may not dominate the SUNYAC this season or next, but they will find a way to succeed, on and off the court.

“I encourage them, you know, not just to go through college but to actually live it,” she said.

Jumbo start

The Tufts Jumbos women improved to 8-0 and did so in demonstrative fashion, beating the Bridgewater State Bears 67-33 Tuesday night.

Tufts and Bridgewater State (5-3) were close in the first half, but the Jumbos, led by forward Michela North with 19 points and seven rebounds, pulled away in the second half, scoring nearly triple the amount (43-15) of the Bears. 

It was a nice win for the Jumbos, not only to keep their winning streak going but also to continue their high level of play against winning teams. Each of their past five opponents, including Bridgewater State, have had records above .500, with a combined record of 28-12.

What’s Tufts’ margin of victory been during this five game stretch? Glad you asked. The Jumbos’ margin of victory against those accomplished early-season teams has been 27.6 points.

Now, the Jumbos have been among those (Amherst, Williams, Colby and Bowdoin included) who have dominated the NESCAC for a few years, but coming off of a 30-3 season, NESCAC regular season and tournament crowns and an appearance in the NCAA Division III Final Four, this season might be a continuation of pinnacle-performance. Then again, three NESCAC teams (No. 3 Amherst, No. 4 Tufts and No. 11 Williams) are ranked in the top 11 of the D3hoops.com Top 25 poll and nine out of the 11 conference teams are at least three games over .500.

So let’s just say that it should be another wild ride in the women’s NESCAC.

The Northeast region’s top players ... of the week

Three players from the Northeast region were named to the D3hoops.com Team of the Week, as of Dec. 10. Senior Carl Joseph of UMass-Boston and sophomore Joey Flannery of Babson were named to the men’s team and freshman Mairead Hynes of Connecticut College was on the women’s team.

Joseph, the 6-5 forward, was also named Little East Conference Player of the Week, averaging 28 points, 8 rebounds and 2.5 steals per game during the two-game stretch. The Beacons did only go 1-1 during those two games, beating MIT 59-52 Dec. 2 and losing to Keene State on Dec. 6 107-97, leaving them a 6-2 overall and 0-1 in the LEC.

Babson forward Joseph Flannery averaged 26.3 points, 5.7 rebounds and an unbelievable 87.5 percent from the free-throw line during the three-game stretch for the 7-1 Beavers. Most importantly, the Beavers won all three games and seem to be continuing the success they had last season, going 20-7 and 11-3 in the New England Women’s and Men’s Athletic Conference.

The Connecticut College Camels were propelled to a 7-1 record in large part because of the performance of Mairead Hynes. The 6-0 forward averaged a dominating double-double at 21.3 points and 17.7 rebounds during a three-game win streak over Trinity (Conn.), St. Joseph (Conn.) and the Coast Guard.  

At 7-1, the Camels have nearly matched their win total from last season. The thing is they don’t play again until Dec. 30. Hopefully the team and its standout freshman will still be in a groove when they return to play.