[media-credit name=’MATTHEW KUTZ/Herald photo’ align=’alignnone’ width=’648′][/media-credit]The women’s basketball team has tried something different on offense this year. Fans watching the squad this year will notice an eerie similarity to the offense run by men’s head coach Bo Ryan on the men’s side. Well, that’s because head coach Lisa Stone has implemented Ryan’s very own swing offense, long a staple of Ryan’s squads dating back to his coaching days at University of Wisconsin–Platteville, into her program this season.

While the change has created a bit of a learning curve for Stone’s squad, Wisconsin’s third–year head coach believes the move to a new offense is the right move for her improving program.

“I like it because it teaches you how to play basketball. You have to pass, you have to cut, you have to screen, you have to hit open shots, you have to rebound and get a feel and read defenses and screens,” Stone said.

Ryan’s offense is based on the continuous movement of players, sending post players out on the wings and forcing guards into post–up positions. With the success Wisconsin guards, particularly former UW–Madison star Devin Harris, have had in the system, Stone is hopeful the new offense will allow her strong corps of guards more options to get to the basket.

“It certainly is an offense that bodes well for our personnel this year. Our [post players] can step out and our guards can go inside,” Stone said. “To get Janese (Banks) and Jolene (Anderson), Akiya (Alexander) as well, on the block to make some moves, you’d like to emulate a Devin Harris.”

Janese Banks did her best Harris impression on Sunday, going 11–for–15 from the field en route to posting 30 points and securing five boards in the 98–56 rout of UW–Parkside. Her presence could be felt on both ends of the court and Coach Stone had nothing but praise for her starting guard.

“She’s in the game the whole time, she’s moving on defense, she understands where she’s supposed to be offensively,” Stone said. “When you look at her defensive pressure and the amount of turnovers that she’s caused, leading into deflections … the way she is playing defense it will lead to her or others putting up some big numbers.”

Having Banks and reigning Big Ten Freshman of the Year Jolene Anderson as star pupils can only help the learning curve. Banks and Anderson displayed their outside shooting mettle on the perimeter last season, but also showed a penchant for cleaning the glass, as Anderson finished second on the team in rebounding (5.6) and Banks finished third (4.9). With the way Stone utilizes her guards, Wisconsin’s head coach believes the new offense will only help to improve her guards’ ability to clean up on the boards.

“We have her crashing the boards and she’s not a safety like your typical point guard where she passes and just backpedals,” Stone said.

Stone understands that this offense is new to the team and that her players need as much game time experience running the new system as possible. With just one more exhibition game before the season opener, Stone says she’ll try to corral the team and get them to slow down and run some semblance of a half court offense. This will not be an easy task for a team that was able to score 34 points off of turnovers, including 18 points in transition in Sunday’s exhibition victory.

“I’m going to try to regulate when we run and when we don’t a little bit,” Stone said. “Five days after [UW–Platteville] we open up with Houston and we need to continue to implement things and if we can get out and get easy baskets, we shot nearly 60 percent from the floor [Sunday], we’ll take those when we can get them.”