DAVID HARDEN/Arizona Daily Wildcat Junior guard Dee-Dee Wheeler sprints down the court in last week's exhibition game against Athletes in Action.

First real game 'huge' for Bonvicini's squad

The UA women's basketball team opens the season with its first official game of the 2003-04 season against Northern Arizona tomorrow at 2 p.m. in McKale Center.

The No. 22 Wildcats are looking to rebound from an 81-77 overtime exhibition loss to Athletes in Action last Thursday.

"The first game of the season is a huge game. It's a way for us to measure where we're at," said Arizona head coach Joan Bonvicini, who is beginning her 13thseason at the helm of the Wildcats.

NAU has a very young team - ten players are freshmen or sophomores. Despite that, the Lumberjacks defeated the Latvian Select team, 72-64, and fell to Athletes in Action, 97-96 in double-overtime, mirroring the Wildcats' exhibition record of 1-1 this season against the same teams.

"They're quick," Bonvicini said of the Lumberjacks. "They run a good motion offense, they run a good break, and they are pretty good defensively."

The identical preseason results for both teams could be somewhat misleading, however, as the Wildcats were without senior guard Aimee Grzyb for the Athletes in Action contest due to a bone bruise in her right knee. Grzyb started 28 of 30 games for the Wildcats last season and shot 42.3 percent from the floor. She is third all-time among Wildcats in 3-pointers made with 148.

Bonvicini said Grzyb is cleared to play and will be back in action for the season opener tomorrow.

On the line in tomorrow's game is the Wildcats' 13-game winning streak in McKale. They have matched the streak set by the 2000-01 squad, and are two games behind the school record of 15 games that began in January 1999 and ended in January 2000.

This game begins a season full of still competition for the Wildcats, who are playing thirteen teams that are currently ranked or received votes in the preseason rankings. Three of those opponents are from the Pacific 10 Conference.

Bonvicini stressed that this is an important game for the Wildcats, especially in the context of continuing to assert their home-court advantage. She also believes the Lumberjacks squad needs no motivation for this game, so the Wildcats need to be ready.

"A lot of their kids felt like they should have been recruited here," Bonvicini said. "We have to be very good defensively, talking on defense and have good rebounding. We need to take care of the ball better and we've got to be smart."