HOME SWEET HOME

 By MIKE KIEFER Chronicle Sports Writer

Important weekend with two potentially tide-turning home games for the women’s team. Time for the Bobcats to live up to that preseason goal of sweeping every team that finished below them last season. They can start with Sacramento State on Thursday.

At Tuesday’s practice, Erica Perry’s offensive finishes were getting the personal attention of coach Tricia Binford, who certainly knows about creating offense with speed instead of size.

Side note: In the department of dynamite media guide artwork, the vintage photo of Binford scoring 34 points against MSU is rivaled only by UM’s shot of Robin Selvig’s afro.

Anyway, personal position coaching isn’t something that Binford usually indulges in during team practices. This may go on behind closed doors all the time, but it hasn’t been something I’ve seen much. Binford said afterward that she and Perry were spending more one-on-one time together. They watched the ‘Cat-Griz film together this week.

Binford wants Perry to capitalize on open driving lanes when MSU has control of the tempo. She’s great at getting lost in transition traffic. More than once at Missoula, a defender thought she was in position only to look down and see Perry dribbling past her. She finished with six points and three assists in 22 minutes and will be back in the starting lineup on Thursday.

Expect beaucoup steals for the league-leader against the sloppiest ball-handling team in the Big Sky.

Binford’s mum on starters besides Perry, so I’m curious who will make the lineup this week to solve two very different problems: Sac State’s perimeter game and NAU’s big players.

One bit of bad news for MSU: Binford said that Rebecca Mercer is “questionable” for Thursday, meaning that her feet aren’t in good shape. Jenny Heringer or rapidly improving Lyndi Seidensticker are the likely stand-ins at the wing. Also expect Sarah Strand to come in at the ’3′ more often. 

Mercer was in considerable pain after 35 minutes on the court, and nearly in tears when she came out of the locker room to talk to me and the Tribune’s George Geise last Friday. She wasn’t participating in drills on Tuesday. I didn’t think much of it because she often sits out in two-game weeks to rest her legs. 

Regardless, it makes sense to save her for NAU.

Binford called both these teams very good at Tuesday’s press conference, but NAU is obviously the bigger challenge. Despite the ‘Jacks ridiculously shallow roster (10 players suited up last weekend for the first time in over a month), they have a much more balanced team now that a still-healing Sade Cunningham is back in action.

Laura Dinkins and block guru Ashley Ingle will require the same kind of defensive intensity that the Bobcats laid on thick at Montana. Dinkins had MSU’s number in each of the teams’ three meetings last year, all NAU blowouts.

Attention: Welsch and I are planning to blog from the games on Thursday, and with blessings from Our Lady of the Wireless Internet, I might even post some photos. I assure I will not be taking said photos. That would be cruel.

Related posts:

1. ROGERS NAMED POTW