The Eastern women’s basketball team is preparing for the upcoming season with the shared goal of adding banners to the rafters of Reese Court.

“The bottom line is we just look up at the wall everyday and think about putting a couple banners up there. We want a banner that says ‘Big Sky Champions’ and we want a banner that says ‘NCAA Tournament,’” said head coach Wendy Schuller.

Luckily for Schuller, who is heading into her 13th season as head coach, the team will have four returning starters to help complete those hopes. “It helps me sleep at night. It definitely does,” said Schuller.

“It just feels good to have a group of players that have great cohesion, who really understand our culture on how we want to be on and off the floor and to be able to teach our young players on how to be apart of that,” she said. “And I think our older players have done a great job on embracing our young ones, and teaching them our systems. Its going to carry us a long way.”

With the return of the four starters, senior Melissa Williams said the best is yet to come.

“I have no doubt that it’s going to be our best season here,” said Williams. “I have so much faith in my team this year and we have four returning starters, so I think that the possibilities are limitless.”

Redshirt sophomore Cece Pearl also said the leadership of the returning players will make a big impact.

“I think the four returning starters is going to be so big for us just to lead us throughout this season,” she said. “I think not only do we have those returning starters, but we have returning players who played a lot of minutes, so either way we’re going to be led this year and it’s going to be good for the rest of us.”

The Eagles finished last season with a 16-14 record, 12-8 in conference play.  They would go on to play in the Big Sky Conference tournament and in the Women’s National Invitation Tournament, but were still “dissatisfied,” said Schuller.

Schuller said the team is more mature and much more focused than they were a year ago.

“We are seeing a lot of the individual skills translate onto the floor and be positive for them. Any time you get affirmation, in terms of positive results, it encourages you to keep doing that action and to work at it and that’s been great,” she said.

Williams said she also sees the growth and maturity of her teammates. She said everything is moving naturally and flowing well together.

Along with working on individual skill growth, Schuller and her coaching staff used the offseason to teach the players to use their strength to be a more physical team.

“Our strength coach worked really hard with our team to put together a program that would get us in a position to be one of the stronger teams in the Big Sky,” said Schuller.

According to goeags.com, the Eagles have been picked to finish third and fifth in the media and coaches preseason polls, respectively.

“We talked briefly about it, but in the end we don’t pay a lot of attention to it because our league is so diverse and every year you just have no idea who’s going to pop up out of nowhere and be great,” said Schuller.

Regardless of poll voting, expectations are still the same for the lady Eagles. Williams, who is playing her last season in an Eagles uniform, wants that conference championship for her team.

“We definitely want to make it to the [Big Sky Conference] tournament. Our expectations are to win the league and win the tournament and anything else would be a disappointment,” said Williams.

The Eagles open up their championship run on the road Nov. 14th against Utah Valley University.