Adia Barnes expects better shooting from Arizona women’s basketball with addition of freshmen and transfers

Arizona Wildcats head coach Adia Barnes has been promising better shooting from her team for a few years. While she’s a defensive-focused coach, she knows the lack of shooting, especially from the outside, has hurt the team for much of her tenure with Arizona women’s basketball. She is once again hopeful that the seven new additions to the program will improve that area during the 2024-25 season.

“I knew I was going to build a deeper team,” Barnes said. “Knew that we had to get better on the perimeter shooting, a little bit more depth inside. And so I think we did a really good job of getting pieces that can help us, players that we can develop. Most players had multiple years.”

Barnes said that she expects help with shooting to come from multiple players. First up is junior Paulina Paris, who transferred in from North Carolina.

“Paulina is a tremendous shooter,” Barnes said. “She’s smart. She’s crafty. Kinda reminds me a lot in some ways of Helena (Pueyo). Different but just smart in the use of her speed and body.”

Freshman Lauryn Swann also brings shooting to the Wildcats. The incoming freshman from Long Island Lutheran High School and Exodus travel ball had some injuries in high school that might have affected her recruiting rankings, but once she got healthy her senior year, she broke into ESPN’s top 100. Barnes said that the amount of testing and prehab work they do in college has helped them focus on ways to help Swann get stronger and stay healthier, but “she’s fine” as of now.

Barnes also expects shooting from Serbian forward Katarina Knežević when she arrives. Both Knežević and German guard Mailien Rolf still had a few weeks of high school to complete, so they will not arrive until closer to the end of June. They both bring things that Barnes thinks Arizona needs, starting with their ability to fit in, be good teammates, and work hard.

“I’ve never had a European player where their families are calling saying, ‘Why isn’t she playing 10 minutes instead of five or 15 or 20?’” Barnes said. “Or not appreciate—they’re always the most appreciative, just best people. And I’m not just saying that because I’m married to a European. It’s just the culture and the way you appreciate what you have. You’re not getting all these facilities and stuff overseas, you’re not getting 10 pairs of shoes. It’s just a different level. And it’s a different appreciation, a different work ethic. It’s the mindset of going pro because they’re already on track to go pro…So I think all those values and stuff, it really adds to the team.”

Although Knežević has not been playing basketball for long, Barnes is already impressed by her skills. The former soccer player is both physical and shoots well. She had been playing with professionals in Spain, including former Wildcat Jade Loville and current Connecticut Sun player Astou Ndour-Fall.

Arizona got more athletic inside with the addition of South Carolina transfer Sahnya Jah. Jah ran into issues with Gamecocks head coach Dawn Staley, who indefinitely suspended her for conduct detrimental to the team. Staley said that Jah could work her way back onto the team or she would help the freshman find a new team. In the end, the decision was to find a new team.

Jah doesn’t come to Arizona as a stranger, though. Not only did Barnes reach out and discuss the situation with Staley, but both Barnes and assistant coach Bett Shelby have a history with Jah.

“You do all your research, obviously, but there’s a long-standing relationship,” Barnes said. “I knew Jah from before, recruiting. Obviously, I had a really, really good relationship with Dawn, so talked to Dawn about it and just knew it was the right thing to do. And you have to remember even before that, Bett Shelby goes back with Jah like four years. Jah was committed to West Virginia before Bett left. So there is a really long-standing relationship with her family and everything. So, we’ve known Jah. Even when (Shelby) first got here two years ago, we were recruiting Jah. It was just so far at the time. It takes our freshman to go away somewhere and then get to kind of spread their wings and they’re like, ‘Oh, okay.’”

Barnes believes that Jah and returning redshirt freshman Montaya Dew will be a great pair alternating between the 3 and 4 positions.

“(Jah’s) gonna really do well here,” Barnes said. “I’m just watching her workouts and you guys will see. We haven’t had an athlete like her and Montaya in that position for a while, and…the four is a very important position for us. It’s what all of our offense goes through. It’s the top of our press. It’s the person who’s in 90 percent of the on-balls. And we lost a good player in Esmery (Martinez). So getting these young players that we can develop, that can be very special, it’s fun. I think you guys are gonna see that and I think the size of Jah and Montana, they can be a three, four, they can switch, they can do a lot of things defensively, I think it’s gonna be a really good combination. So it enables us to move Montaya.”

The biggest thing for Barnes was bringing in players who can stay for a while. While Ajae Yoakum only has one year to play, the other six newcomers have multiple years.

The ability to develop players was important to Barnes. She especially sees incoming sophomore post player Jorynn Ross as someone who will improve during her time at Arizona while giving them the size they need right now.

“She’s someone who’s really hungry to learn,” Barnes said. “She’s really raw, but she has better size than we thought even before we got her. When she came on a visit, we were like, ‘Oh, you’re taller than we thought.’ We thought she was about 6-2. She’s a legit 6-3 and strong. So I’m excited to develop her and work with her. I think she’s gonna help us a lot, too.”

An improvement in shooting would excite most Arizona fans, but Barnes is known as a defensive coach. She doesn’t see most of the team being oriented that way right now, but she believes they will improve. Once again, it comes down to development and work ethic.

“We are going to be fine because we have players that really have the will and the want to do it,” Barnes said. “Now, we’re probably not as athletic overall on the perimeter as I’d like, but I think that with the skill offensively and they’re young, I think it’s gonna pay off. But probably, like in the next couple of years, we need to get more athletic on the perimeter. But the good thing is we’re gonna bring a lot better shooters, so there’s always that balance. You shoot a lot better, but the defense may not be there. But I think that these players are competitive, want to get better, want to learn, so they’re hungry. And the example’s Jada (Williams). Didn’t come in here the most athletic, the fastest, but when you have a heart and you have a want to do it, she ended up being a good defender, because when you want to play, you give a little bit more space when you’re smart. And you have the desire, like the intrinsic desire to want to be great and want to defend, you’re going to be a good defender.”

Arizona’s defense and perimeter athleticism took a blow when it lost guard Courtney Blakely at the end of the portal window. Barnes said that there wasn’t a lot that they could do about that because Blakely was facing academic challenges that they couldn’t overcome at Arizona despite extensive efforts.

“With Courtney transferring here from Middle Tennessee, she lost a lot of credits,” Barnes said. “So it was gonna take her like a year and a half longer, and it was that we didn’t offer what she really wanted. So for her, it was good to go back and be able to graduate, and that was kind of the only way she could do it. So that was a lot of the reason.”

Blakely’s loss also made the group of guards a bit smaller. Once Rolf arrives, Arizona will have five guards on the roster next season.

While Barnes has opted for a bigger roster this year, the most important thing for her was to keep her core young players together. She accomplished that, keeping all four of the freshmen who came in as the No. 3 class in the country last year. In addition to Dew and Williams, the Wildcats return Breya Cunningham and Skylar Jones. Bringing Jah in gives them five of ESPN’s top 100 players from the class of 2023.

“Keeping that core together was really important,” Barnes said. “You know, Breya, Jada, and Skye…that was key because they had so much experience as freshmen. So I felt like they…got two or three years of experience in one year. And then putting Montaya in that was really important to keep them because Montaya’s been practicing all year and before she got hurt, so she kind of knows this and she was here last December. So keeping all of them together was critical, I think, for our success long-term. Because if you think, after this year, we’re only gonna lose two players again, so we’re really young again. So I think if I can keep this core together for multiple years, we’re gonna be really good.”