Before you grab your pitchforks and torches to come murder me, read the entire article and think about it; then you can chase me down.

Don’t get me wrong, I love this team. The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee women’s basketball team is a very productive group of the hardest working girls on campus. No one here or anywhere will or should be knocking how hard they work.

However, I need to ask about some mistakes that have put the Panthers at 2-4.

In the first game of the season, junior Traci Edwards scored 30 points and grabbed 14 boards and senior Aubri Rote scored 20, with 6-for-7 shooting from beyond the arc, as the Panthers beat Chicago State 88-76.

The only problem were the 20-plus turnovers in the game by the Panthers. Life looked pretty sweet – until the next game, anyway. The Panthers lost the next three games to Illinois, Dayton and Miami, respectively.

Dayton won by one point, after an end-of-the-game pair of free throws killed the Panthers chances. A highlight of these three losses, though, was the overtime play against Miami, when Miami gave up a lead to the Panthers, pulling it into overtime, only for the Panthers to throw it away, again on turnovers.

Central Connecticut was the team’s second victory, with a huge second half that propelled the Panthers past the Blue Devils 77-51. In this game, the Panthers shot 60.7 percent in the second half to give them a 46.6 percent shooting average for the game. However, this win didn’t last, as was the case when the Panthers went to the University of Wisconsin on Tuesday, the Badgers beat the Panthers up and down the court, handing UWM its fourth loss, 79-59.

Before I pick apart the big-time mistakes that crippled the team, let’s take a look at five players that deserve some individual recognition.

First off is junior Traci Edwards, who leads the team in points (114), rebounds (64) and points per game (19). Next is senior Aubri Rote, the missile launcher, who so far has 15 threes and six steals.

The offensive coordinator of this team is junior Jody Crumble, who leads the team with 18 assists and has been an integral part of this lineup. Off the bench, the Panthers have some extremely talented girls, led by freshman Jineen Williams and sophomore Jodie McClain.

Williams leads the bench with 30 points and McClain has 29 with seven steals. The team itself is killing opponents with 38.3 rebounds per game and a three-point percentage at 36.

However, the real killer has been turnovers. In six games, the Panthers have had 141 turnovers, 33 more turnovers than their opponents. On average, the women’s basketball team gives up 23.5 turnovers per game, compared to the 19.5 that they force from opponents.

As a result, the Panthers lost to Miami and Dayton due to some late turnovers and, at least in the Dayton game, a late foul that put Dayton’s best free throw shooter on the line. Another painful point is the fact that in the four losses, UWM has shot around 40 percent for those games, two of which were under 40 percent.

So what can we expect the rest of the season? Hopefully this team has learned from its mistakes in ball handling and will improve on the amount of turnovers. Another thing is improvement on inconsistent shooting that has crippled the Panthers thus far.

UWM’s next game is Dec. 13 in a home game against Drake, at 7 p.m. in the Klotsche Center.

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