Heading into the 2024-25 season the Northwest College women’s basketball team will be adding nine freshmen to its roster, with the Trappers heading on the road to play difficult competition to kick off the season.

NEW ADDITIONS

The new Trapper faces include players from around the region, as well as two new players joining from Spain.

The first addition for the Trappers is Ashlyn Wight, a guard from Perry, Utah, who will bring shooting to the team.

“She’s pretty small, but she’s feisty and she can really shoot it,” coach Cody Helenbolt said in August. “She got a lot of face guarding in high school. I think she was second team 5A All-State in Utah, and she’s going to be open a lot more than she ever has been.”

Another strong shooter joining the Trappers is Elise Swan from Casper, with Helenbolt noting his former players from Douglas encouraged him to recruit the Natrona County High School grad for the Trappers.

“She’s a really good spot up shooter,” Helenbolt said. “Some of my kids in Douglas actually recommended her. They played with her before and they said that if you need someone who can shoot, when she gets hot and starts shooting, she’s going to keep making 3’s. It’s not going to be like making two and then missing five.”

Another Wyoming athlete joining the Trappers is Amanda Jenkins, a guard from Wind River who will also bring shooting along with defense to Northwest.

“She’s another kid who can shoot the ball, and she’s played a lot of basketball growing up on the reservation,” Helenbolt said. “She can get out in transition, she was one of the leaders in Wyoming 2A in steals. She can do a little bit of offense and defense for us.”

Wrapping up the Trapper shooters is Marina Torro Fernandez from Malaga, Spain, who adds some length while shooting at the forward position.

“She’s another kid that can shoot and she’s a little bit bigger so that’s nice,” Helenbolt said. “She’ll probably be like a three and a four for us. She had signed right before I got here. She’s another kid that can stretch the floor for us a little bit.”

The other Trapper from Spain will be Emma Pique from Llavaneres, who is a strong defender who brings added athleticism to the Trappers standing at 5 feet, 11 inches.

“She’s really long and athletic,” Helenbolt said. “The thing that I’m excited for her is that she is one of the fastest kids with the ball that I think I’ve ever seen and she just has tremendous potential. I’d say her and Marina both have potential to be real impact players for us and can kind of compliment those international kids that we have coming back … Those were big signings I think for us just to allow us to be a little bit diverse.”

Another signing from Wyoming is Bella Yates from Laramie, who will bring height to the Trappers which Helenbolt was grateful to find after starting recruiting late.

“That was probably the most difficult thing was getting post players super late,” Helenbolt said. “There’s just not a lot of size out there at that point when I got hired … Bella was one of our first signings, and she’s another kid that’s really impressed me. The nice thing about her is she is not strictly a post, she has a nice touch on her shot. She has the ability to at least take a couple dribbles in there and not look totally out of place. She’s shown the ability to hit some outside shots too.”

Another post player for the Trappers is Sydnee Harris from Rock Springs, who will bring a physical presence for the team this season.

“She’s just a really big, physical kid,” Helenbolt said. “A good offensive rebounder, and has a lot of potential, that I think with some work she could really give us a physical presence that we’d probably lack a little bit.”

One of the final recruits for the Trappers is a dual sport athlete at Northwest. Sienna Fuller will transition from soccer to the court once the season concludes.

“I haven’t seen her play much basketball … Obviously she’s a good athlete with the ability to play multiple sports and just a great kid overall,” Helenbolt said. “Hopefully she will add to our three and four spots a little bit as well.”

Another Trapper addition  will be Taylee Carlson from the volleyball team, a middle blocker who will transition over to help bring more height to the team once her season concludes.

FIRST GAMES

Heading out on the road to start the season the Trappers will go to Twin Falls, Idaho, to take part in a pair of games.

The first game will be one of the toughest early season games for Northwest, taking on NJCAA No. 4 ranked Eastern Arizona at 1 p.m. on Friday.

“I’m excited to get to play somebody new and kind of see the process move on to the next step,” Helenbolt said in an interview Monday. “See them play against somebody new and find the things that we need to work on.”

Following that contest the Trappers will take on Community Christian College out of Redlands, California, at 1 p.m. on Saturday.

“Overall from where we started to where we are now, we’re to the point where we can now execute things that I want to execute,” Helenbolt said. “I like to get a lot of the stuff in early so then we can work on it and tweak it. What that’s going to do is it’s going to lead to some moments where we’re not firing on all cylinders early, but hopefully as the year goes on that we can kind of improve.”

Northwest heads to Riverton the next weekend for a pair of games, before playing the first home game of the season on Tuesday, Nov. 12, against Miles Community College.