Fresh crop

The theme song for the 2003-04 womens basketball season at Olympic College could be “Short People” since none of the team members are taller than 5-11. Better yet, they might go with “Grease Lightning” since they’ve got more speed than they know what to do with.

“What we lost in height (from last season) we definitely made up in talent,” OC coach Rick Peters said. “We’re quicker with more athletic ability and I’d give up size for that any day.”

“We’re much more talented now than we were last year,” said Robbie Lee, one of three sophomores on the OC roster. “We’re quicker and our big girls are quick with a lot of finesse.”

Most of OC’s talent is homegrown from the West Sound with freshman point guard Erin Mueller from Billings, Mont.

The Rangers also bring an explosive offense to the court as witnessed in a scrimmage on Tuesday night when they beat Highline 94-74.

“There’s a lot of offensive skills,” Peters said. “I knew we had some offensive production, but I wasn’t sure how it would come together.”

The freshmen class had little trouble fitting into the Rangers’ offense as South Kitsap grad Jamae Feddock scored 25 points to go with 10 rebounds and four assists in her first college game. Central Kitsap grad Adria Layne had 23 points and seven rebounds despite early foul trouble. Lee added 16 points and sophomore CK product Amber McKinnis scored 15 as OC took most of its shots in the paint.

“We’re going to attack the basket more this year with all the speed we have,” Lee said.

“You can’t put up 90 points every night, but we’re capable of going 70-plus,” Peters said. “Our focus now is on our defense so we can get better at man-to-man coverage to keep the other teams under 60 points.”

Northwest Athletic Association of Community College teams with the traditional slow-footed center will have a trouble setting up an offense once the Rangers put all of their defensive pieces in place.

“It’s going to be tough to get back on us this year,” Peters said. “We just fly and that’s a deadly combination.”

“We’ll field a talented five as long as we stay injury-free because we don’t have much depth with only nine players.”

The women have one last scrimmage at home against Green River at 6:30 p.m. Monday.

The Rangers officially begin their season at 4 p.m. on Friday in the Shoreline Tourney against NWAACC North foes Bellevue. Their first home game is 5:30 p.m. on Nov. 25 against Pierce.

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