Dayton hired Green on Sept. 11, four days after Jim Jabir stepped down because of health reasons. Green left her job as an assistant coach at Northwestern, where she spent one season, to return to a program where she coached from 2012-15.
Six of the players on the roster were on the team two years ago: fifth-year senior guard Kelley Austria; senior center Saicha Grant-Allen; senior guard Christy Macioce; senior forward Andrijana Cvitkovic; junior guard Jenna Burdette; and junior guard JaVonna Layfield.
Green is getting to know the players she recruited but hasn’t coached and getting to know again a group of players she coached two years ago.
“I watched the freshmen a lot in AAU and high school, but it’s nice to see them in our system and get them out there with our kids,” Green said. “Even the sophomores, I didn’t get a chance to watch too many of their games last year. I get to see Laura Cannatelli and and Maddy Dennis on the floor and get an idea of what we’re working with. That’s really helped me these last two weeks.”
The Flyers lost one player from the roster this fall. Madeline Blais, a 6-foot-1 forward/guard who sat out last season after transferring from Marist, returned home to Exeter, N.H., because she's fighting ulcerative colitis. She talked about her illness in a video on YouTube and announced on Instagram she was heading home for the fall.
“Praying with all I’ve got that one day I’ll touch that court again,” Blais wrote.
Green doesn’t know if she’ll return to Dayton.
“Right now we’re just focused on her getting healthy and getting better,” Green said. “She had to go home and have her family take care of here. It’s just too hard for her here. I hope for the best.”
Green and her coaching staff have worked the recruiting trail hard in the last month. One 2017 commitment, Jaelynn Penn, a 5-10 wing from Louisville, Ky., reopened her recruitment after Jabir resigned and picked Indiana instead. Victoria Oglesby, a 5-foot-8 guard in the class of 2018 from Suwanee, Ga., has also reopened her recruitment after picking the Flyers.
“That’s part of it when this stuff happens,” Green said. “You’ve just got to keep working. We have other people we’re in a really good spot with. We had an official visit last weekend. We already have our one commitment who’s still with us (Samatha Breen, a 6-2 post from Cranberry, Pa). You’ve just got to keep working. You win some and you lose some. You want people who want to be here and be part of our program.”
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