SALT LAKE CITY — The Utah women’s basketball team may soon be getting a key contributor back.
Redshirt senior guard Daneesha Provo could return to action as soon as Saturday, head coach Lynne Roberts said. Provo has been out for the start of the season due to an ACL tear.
“She’s been practicing full now for a few days, that’s the first step. Any time you tear your ACL, the biggest thing is between your ears. It’s a long recovery and then there’s that trust in your own body. That practice time helps,” Roberts said.
Provo will be on limited minutes as she gets acclimated to games again. She averaged 13.5 points per game last season.
“In the game, it’ll be limited the first couple of times she gets out there, just so she can see that she is capable, that her body can handle it, her knee is healthy. It also depends on the game. Do we have an opportunity to get her feet wet or is it really tight and we don’t have the luxury to do that?” Roberts said. “First and foremost, we’re trying to win, and then get her acclimated and just feeling as confident as possible. She looks pretty good.”
In Provo’s absence, Roberts has employed a platoon system, playing groups of five players at the same time and rarely making individual subs. The approach has allowed a young team to play through adversity.
“The depth has enabled everyone to get to play and get some experience. That’s what I’ve done the platoon subbing. It allows players to play through things. We’ve got so many young guys that just needed to be able to play through mistakes, just play,” Roberts said. “That’s why you see the parity in minutes. Everybody’s playing about the same amount of minutes. That’s really nice, it’s a nice luxury to have, and it will play forward when we get into Pac-12 play.”
Roberts will change up the substitution pattern in the next 2-3 games as the Utes wind down their nonconference schedule and head into Pac-12 play.
“Just mixing up who plays with who. I don’t know that I’m ready to completely abandon (the substitution pattern), like not do it at all, but we’ll start mixing when Daneesha Provo starts to come back, that gets us up to 11 — we can’t play six at one time — so that’s going to affect that,” Roberts said.
Utah has been on a roll as of late, recording five straight wins — including an overtime win at BYU. The Utes play Nevada on Saturday at 11:30 a.m. at the Huntsman Center, then host Providence and Weber State to close out nonconference. Pac-12 play is fast approaching for the Utes, and it will be tough. Four Pac-12 schools are in the AP Top 10, with Stanford ranked No. 1.
“I want to see us just continue to get better and not be satisfied with just winning, not just be outcome-driven, but be process, improvement-driven. This league, we have three teams in the top four now. … We’ve got to keep improving, keep staying hungry. Just some urgency about getting better,” Roberts said.