With new faces among both players and coaches alike, the Weber State women’s basketball team held their first practice of the fall on Monday afternoon.

“I thought we did well and worked really hard,” said new Weber State assistant coach Laura Terry. “I’m excited because we have really good leadership, and I think we will be flying under the radar.”

Terry joined the WSU coaching staff earlier this summer, after spending the last two seasons as a graduate assistant coach at Western Kentucky.

“I’m excited to be here,” Terry said. “I think we’re going to surprise a lot of people.”

Another new face on the roster this year is freshman forward Jocelyn Adams, who joins the Wildcats from Vancouver, Washington.

“I’m really excited. I think we’ve all worked really hard, and we’re getting a lot closer together,” Adams said. “I’m excited to start playing and I think we’re gonna do really well.”

The Wildcats’ head coach Bethann Ord is entering her fourth year with the team, and she said although the team had a good practice, they still had more work to get done before the season starts.

“We’ve got a lot of work to do. We had a really good preseason, the girls worked really hard, but there’s a lot to get done,” Ord said. ”With so many new girls, we had to take some time with certain parts of practice, but I thought the effort was there, and I thought that the girls were really excited about practice.”

Senior guard Brianna Averette thought the preseason went better than expected.

“I think we all worked really really hard as a team. We have a lot of work to do, but I’m really excited about how things are looking,” she said.

Averette appeared in all 29 games for the Wildcats last season, starting in 11 of the games. She averaged 3.9 points per game, while shooting 89.7 percent from the free throw line and 42 percent from the field. As one of the team’s three seniors, Averette is ready to step into a leadership role for the team this year.

“I’m all about leading by example,” Averette said. “I feel like if I work hard, and my teammates see me working hard, they’re gonna want to follow behind that.”

The Wildcats are looking to build off the progress they made last season when they finished 7-22 (3-17 conference) one year after going 0-29 (0-20 conference).

“We’re definitely changing the culture, and in a positive way,” Ord said. “You’ve got to focus forward all the time and you can’t worry about the past.”

Weber State will hold their annual Purple and White game on Oct. 22 before hosting Adams State in an exhibition match on Nov. 6. The regular season starts for the Wildcats on Nov. 14 when they host Montana-Western, and they will begin their Big Sky Conference schedule on Jan. 1 when they host Eastern Washington.

“I think we’re going to surprise a lot of people,” Terry said. “One thing I can guarantee is that when we’re on the court, we’re gonna give 110 percent no matter what. Win or lose.”