MINNEAPOLIS – Suzy Merchant is counting her blessings these days for things that most basketball coaches take for granted.
The Michigan State women’s basketball coach has multiple players at each position. She doesn’t have to play three or four frontcourt players at a time. She can have a true bench and playing rotation.
She lost all that last season during an injury-riddled campaign that had her playing with a shoestring roster and made for a trying few months as Michigan State finished 15-15 and 8-9 in the Big Ten.
“It was difficult,” Merchant recalled on Wednesday at Big Ten media days. “I felt bad for the kids that were playing. There just weren’t enough of them, and you’re playing three or four post players at a time. It’s not their fault, they had to do what they had to do. It was a unique season.”
Now, though, Michigan State is back for 2022-23 with a refilled roster and hope that it can stay injury-free and get back to Big Ten title contention.
Michigan State lost three players to season-ending injuries: Tory Ozment and Julia Ayrault before the season and Moira Joiner during the year. All three are now back as veterans, and Merchant said their returns will give Michigan State a boost beyond just what they provide in the box score.
“You don’t teach experience,” Merchant said. “When you didn’t have them, you felt it. They were glue kids, they could get you 10, 12 a game, all three of them. They knew the system, they knew what was important in how we do things, so to me that was always a tough loss bigger than points and rebounds.”
They’re joined by three transfers and two recruited freshmen that give the Spartans newfound depth.
Guard Kamaria McDaniel returns to the Big Ten after being the conference’s second-leading scorer at 19.8 points per game for Penn State in 2019-20. She then transferred to Baylor but played in only 10 games there in two seasons due to injury.
The team also added former Michigan Miss Basketball Gabby Elliott of Clemson, who was an All-ACC freshman player last year, and forward Stephanie Visscher of Stephen F. Austin.
Merchant pointed out that while all three are new to the program, all three have connections: McDaniel and Elliott are Detroit natives and Visscher is friends with fellow Swede and Spartans sophomore forward Matilda Ekh.
“I think that helps when you get a transfer kid that there’s some kind of love and understanding of what it means to be a Spartan,” Merchant said.
Those newcomers, plus returners like All-Big Ten freshman DeeDee Hagemann and senior forward Taiyer Parks, will have to replace the production of Nia Clouden, the first-round WNBA Draft pick who left last spring as the program’s second-leading scorer.
If Michigan State can keep all of those players available, Merchant likes her program’s chances to do that. And after everything the Spartans went through last year, they’re due for a healthy year.
“The basketball gods are going to flip it on me and I’m going to be able to have one healthy team,” Merchant said.
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Michigan State back with depth and new hope after injury-filled season - MLive.com
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