Women's Basketball ODAC Championship trophy

2023-24 W&L Women's Basketball Season Preview

Generals picked to repeat as ODAC champs, receiving votes in preseason Top 25 polls

11/2/2023 11:00:00 AM

LEXINGTON, Va. - The Old Dominion Athletic Conference released its 2023-24 Women's Basketball Preseason Poll on Thursday and Washington and Lee collected all possible first-place votes to top the poll with 144 points.

The Generals claimed 12 of the 13 first-place votes to top Shenandoah by 15 points. Right behind the Hornets was Bridgewater, who claimed the final first-place vote and 120 points. Randolph-Macon and Randolph finished fourth and fifth, respectively, with RMC edging the WildCats by just two points for fourth.

W&L is coming off its most successful season in program history, in which it set program records for wins (22) and winning percentage (.759), while adding the second ODAC Championship in program history (2010). The team plowed through ODAC play during the regular season, winning 16-of-18 contests, before winning all three ODAC Tournament games by an average of 19.3 points per game to gain the league's automatic bid into the NCAA Tournament. Following the season, the Generals were recognized as the NCAA Division III Statistical Champions in blocks per game (8.3), while setting numerous other records, in addition to their win marks, including blocks per game and total blocks in a season (241).

The Generals are led into the 2023-24 season by 12th-year head coach Christine Clancy, who earned her second straight ODAC Coach of the Year award last season. Clancy has posted a 161-113 (.588) in her first 11 seasons with the Blue and White, with an overall coaching record of 183-119 (.606) in 13 seasons.

2022-23 Women's Basketball Championship pic

2023-24 ODAC Women's Basketball Preseason Poll

Washington and Lee University (12) 144 pts.
Shenandoah University 129 pts.
Bridgewater College (1) 120 pts.
Randolph-Macon College 105 pts.
Randolph College 103 pts.
Roanoke College 88 pts.
Guilford College 83 pts.
University of Lynchburg 66 pts.
Ferrum College 53 pts.
Eastern Mennonite University 48 pts.
Averett University 29 pts.
Hollins University 29 pts.
Virginia Wesleyan University 17 pts.

National Poll/Preseason Awards

The Generals are receiving votes in both the Women's Basketball Coaches Association Preseason Top 25 and the D3hoops.com preseason poll, with a total of eight votes in the D3hoops poll and six in the WBCA. Both polls have identical Top 3 teams, with defending champion Transylvania on top, followed by New York University and Christopher Newport University. The WBCA has Smith College and the University of Scranton rounding out its Top 5, while D3hoops ranks Tufts and Rhode Island College as fourth and fifth, respectively.

For a look at the complete WBCA Preseason Top 25, click here. For the D3hoops.com poll, click here.

Sophomore Mary Schleusner also received preseason recognition, earning a spot on the D3hoops.com Preseason All-America Fourth Team on November 1. Schleusner received numerous accolades throughout her 2022-23 rookie season, including D3hoops.com National Rookie of the Year, ODAC Rookie of the Year and ODAC Defensive Player of the Year. To read the full release, click here.

We are excited to start this new season and establish our identity as the 2023-24 W&L Women’s Basketball team. We have lofty goals and standards for this season, but are committed to taking it one day at a time and living into our team motto of “Strive Together.”

I think we will be a really fun team to watch. We have a great balance of experience and young talent, we have speed and length, and a good combination of players that can knock down shots, create off the dribble, and score in the paint. We’re going to push tempo and have a lot of different names in the scoring column. If we can show consistent effort on the defensive end -- blocking shots, creating turnovers, and owning the boards -- we will be a very difficult match up.

Right now we are focused on competing hard every day, pushing each other to get better, and having a lot of fun!

Head Coach Christine Clancy (12th Season)

2023-24 Schedule Overview

The Generals have 25 games slated for regular season play, with just over half of them (13) to be played in the home Holekamp Gym. Among the other 12 games away from Lexington, 11 will be true road games, with a neutral contest in Atlanta.

The season gets underway on November 11 with two straight road games at Marymount and Averett (11/15), before the Generals return home to host Salisbury, Lynchburg and Juniata in a November 18-19 invitational. W&L will face Salisbury on the 18th and Juniata on the 19th, while the Hornets will square off against the two non-ODAC schools in neutral games.

W&L will continue at home in three of their next four games against Emory (11/25) and Bridgewater (11/29), before welcoming Lynchburg back to campus on December 2. A road ODAC game against Hollins will also be in the mix the day after the Emory home game. The Generals will then hit the road to take on Eastern Mennonite on December 6, before traveling to Oglethorpe to face Centre on December 16 on the Stormy Petrels the next day.

After breaking for Christmas, 13 of the Generals’ final 14 games will be in ODAC play, with a December 30 matchup against Virginia Wesleyan kicking off a home stretch of five games out of six. Those opponents include Roanoke (1/3), Guilford (1/7), Mary Washington (1/13) and Shenandoah (1/17), with a road date against Ferrum (1/10) tossed in.

Three of the next four games will see the Generals on the road, before they split their final four contests between hosting and traveling. The remaining road games consist of Randolph-Macon (1/20), VWU (1/28), Lynchburg (1/31), Randolph (2/14) and Roanoke (2/17), while the final home games will be Randolph (1/24), Averett (2/7) and RMC (2/10).

In the history of the W&L women’s basketball program (1993-94), the Generals have never faced four of the teams on the 2023-24 schedule and have fewer than three all-time matchups against an additional two. The new opponents this year will be Centre, Oglethorpe, Salisbury and Juniata, with just one prior meeting against Emory and two against Marymount.

As in-state rivals, W&L and UMW have faced off plenty of times over the years, with the Eagles holding an 11-8 all-time record against the Blue and White. The 2023-24 season will mark the seventh consecutive year that these two teams will face-off, with the Generals having won four of the previous six meetings, with three of the six needing overtime to decide a winner.

Last season was another of continued success for W&L in ODAC play, as the Generals posted their second straight 16-2 season in league play, and are 50-8 in the last four seasons against conference counterparts.

The ODAC Tournament will commence on February 20 with first-round matchups that will send the No. 10 seed to the No. 7 seed and the No. 9 seed to the No. 8. The winners of those two matchups will join the top-six teams in Salem, Va., for the remainder of the tournament. The quarterfinal round will be played on February 23, followed by the semifinals on February 24 and the championship game on February 25.

Key Returners

Senior Hanna Malik returns as one of W&L’s top outside scorers, as she garnered First Team All-ODAC accolades last season with an average of 12.7 points per game on 33.8-percent shooting from long range. Malik added 3.0 rebounds and 2.4 assists per game across 25.6 minutes per contest, and she looks to move up several W&L program statistical leaderboards as a senior, including the 1,000-threshold.

Senior Grace O’Connor claimed Third Team All-ODAC honors a season ago as the primary facilitator on offense for the Generals. O’Connor scored 5.9 points per game, but led the team in assist average (3.6) and total (105), while adding 6.0 rebounds, 1.3 blocks and 0.7 steals per game as well. O’Connor started all 29 games last season and was on the floor for an average of 27.4 minutes per game, a team high.

Sophomore Elka Prechel shined for the Generals last season, breaking the program’s single-season three-point field goal record of 75 by connecting 79 makes from beyond the arc on 36.1 percent from outside. Her three-point percentage ranked second on last year’s team, but is first among returning players. Prechel finished her rookie season averaging 9.0 points per game across 29 games and 20.3 minutes per game.

Sophomore Mary Schleusner highlights the returning players after she was named the D3hoops.com National Rookie of the Year, as well as the ODAC Rookie and Defensive Player of the Year. Schleusner set a new program record for total rebounds (344), while narrowly missing the rebounding average record (11.9) for a single season, and she scored 14.2 points per game and blocked 3.1 shots per contest. Her impressive rookie season already has her in the program’s career Top 10 lists for total blocks (90) and just outside the Top 10 in total rebounds.

In total, this year’s team returns 12-of-16 players from last year’s conference championship squad, which includes 75.6 percent of its scoring and 74.5 percent of its rebounding.

Emma Robertson enters her senior season having played in 42 games over the last three seasons.

On the court, Robertson has totaled 78 points while shooting 42.5 percent from the floor, which included a career-high 45.5 percent last season. She also adds career totals of 81 rebounds, 19 blocks and 10 steals.

Off the court, Robertson has been named a W&L Scholar Athlete in 6-of-6 semesters with three ODAC All-Academic Team citations as a neuroscience and Spanish double-major. She spent the summer of 2023 volunteering at the main hospital of Medical University of South Carolina, and she also supports the Ronald McDonald House Charities and the Yellow Brick Road through W&L's Theta Zeta chapter of Alpha Delta Pi.

Hanna Malik has made 64 appearances in her career and is one of the Generals' top outside-scoring threats heading into the 2023-24 season.

Malik is averaging an even 12.0 points per game in her career thus far on 37.6 percent shooting overall and 37.9 percent from beyond the arc. She has made at least 70 three-point shots in both of her two full seasons, including a then program-record tying 75 during her sophomore season. Malik enters her senior season as the program's all-time leader in three-point percentage.

A cognitive and behavioral science major, Malik has earned W&L Scholar Athlete status five teams and been selected to the ODAC All-Academic Team three times. Away from the gym, Malik is a Campus Captain for The Hidden Opponent, the Social Media Coordinator for “24,” and she spent the summer of 2022 as a scribe for a psychiatrist.

Grace O'Connor has played in 64 games over the past three seasons, including all 56 in the last two.

O'Connor excelled in an expanded role as a junior, posting career highs in rebounding average (6.0), total rebounds (174), assists per game (3.6) and total assists (105). For her career, O'Connor is averaging 5.0 points on 41.9 percent shooting overall, with 4.6 rebounds per game (292 total) and 2.5 assists per game (161 total).

Off the court, O'Connor has claimed two W&L Scholar Athlete and ODAC All-Academic citations each as a business administration major. This past summer, O'Connor completed an internship for Transparensea Fuels.

Upcoming Milestones and Records

Head Coach Christine Clancy enters the 2023-24 season needing just 17 more wins to reach the 200-win mark in her coaching career. Clancy has spent 11 of her 13 seasons with the Generals, compiling a 161-113 (.588) record in Lexington with a 183-119 (.606) in her career as a whole. Clancy is already the program's winningest head coach and she currently has the highest winning percentage of any head coach in program history.

Hanna Malik has several milestones looming ahead of the upcoming season. She has scored 765 points in her career, leaving her just 235 away from becoming the 15th player in program history to reach 1,000 points. She has scored at least 314 points in each of the last two seasons on an average of 12.2 points per game in that span.

Currently, Malik ranks first in program history in both three-point percentage (.379) and free throw percentage (.899), while ranking fourth in made three-point field goals (171). Next on the three-point field goal list is Emily Perszyk ‘18 at 195. If Malik can continue her streak of 70 or more made threes in a season, she would vault past both Perszyk and Taylor Casey ’20, and into second place.

Despite only one season under her belt, Mary Schleusner already ranks sixth in program history in blocks, after she swatted 90 in 2022-23. She needs just two more to move into fifth place, seven to get to fourth place and 66 to gain the No. 3 position.

Not only did Elka Prechel set the program record for three-point field goals made in her first season on campus, she did so at an efficient rate. Prechel knocked down her long-range shots 36.1 percent of the time which is currently the third-highest career mark in program history, trailing only Malik and Casey (.362).

With her team-leading 105 assists last season, Grace O'Connor has put herself in a position to finish as one of the top passers in program history. O'Connor has now dished out 161 assists in her career, and she needs 56 more to tie Allie Long ‘11 for 10th place in program history. If O’Connor can reach the century mark in dimes this season, that would put her seventh place in program history between Becca Bolton ‘12 (275) and Jessica Morton ’00 (228).