Correspondent photo / Robert Hayes YSU head coach Melissa Jackson leads the Penguins through a drill during the first full team practice of the summer on Tuesday at Stambaugh Stadium.

YOUNGSTOWN — There’s plenty of new faces these days around the Youngstown State women’s basketball program.

In addition to new head coach Melissa Jackson and the new coaching staff, the Penguins have added 10 new players to the program, including four transfers and six freshmen.

Jackson and her staff largely managed to keep YSU’s large incoming freshman class intact that was recruited by previous coaches John Barnes and John Nicolais. Only one player from the class changed their mind about coming to YSU after the coaching change.

“It’s a big transition period when there are so many new faces,” said returning grad student guard Malia Magestro. “(With) 10 newcomers, I think things are going to take a lot of time, but so far in the past two weeks of workouts, I’m very impressed with how everyone has come together and rose to the standards that we set at the beginning. So I’m really excited to see where this team will go.”

Over the past couple months, YSU added junior guard Xoe Rosalez, senior guard Jewel Watkins, redshirt freshman guard Dacia Lewandowski, and redshirt junior forward Faith Burch from the transfer portal.

“It was so important to get some experience out of the portal,” Jackson said.

Rosalez averaged 9.8 points per game and was her team’s third leading scorer at Seward County Community College in Kansas, where she led the team in minutes played. Watkins is a Columbus native who spent her first two seasons at Coppin State, before transferring to Charlotte last season.

“Jewel Watkins is somebody that we really recruited hard. That we were able to land her just speaks to what we have here at YSU and the type of players that we can bring in on a regular basis. Jewel has the potential to be really good in this league,” Jackson said. “Xoe — we really needed to bring in some depth at the point guard spot, so she’s definitely brought some energy and athleticism to that position, which I’m super excited about.”

Both Lewandowski and Burch are players that had prior connections with Jackson.

A local product from Warren G. Harding, Burch played for Jackson last season when she was an assistant at Cleveland State. She averaged 3.6 points and 3.9 rebounds per game on the Vikings’ Horizon League championship team. When she was the Zips’ head coach, Jackson recruited Lewandowski to Akron, where she missed all of last season with an injury.

“Being able to bring in a player like Faith Burch, who I had the opportunity to coach before, I know what I’m going to get from her every single day and that’s unbelievable effort and energy. She’s displayed that right from the get-go, so that’s been huge for us,” Jackson said. “Dacia Lewandowski is somebody I recruited really hard at Akron, so I’m super excited to be reconnected with her. She’s coming off a little bit of an injury, so she’s not 100%, but she’s been super vocal.”

YSU’s freshman class consists of Ohio natives Sophia Gregory (West Branch), Danielle Cameron (Olmsted Falls) and Erica King (St. Vincent-St. Mary), Kentucky natives Hayden Barrier and Sarah Baker and West Virginia native Ashlynn Van Tassell.

“The freshmen — they’re really talented, but this is their first taste of college basketball, so their heads are spinning right now and that’s usually every freshman at this stage in the game, but I’m super excited about that class,” Jackson said. “I will say they have bonded really quickly and it’s very cool to see their chemistry develop as we go.”

While the six returners began steadily working with Jackson back when she was hired, the newcomers finally arrived on campus and moved in during the weekend of June 22.

That first week, the Penguins broke into smaller groups throughout the week for workouts and practice sessions. Then on Tuesday, YSU had its first full-team practice of the summer.

“It was really important in that first week that we do the smaller groups, so we broke them up by position. Then our coaches were really able to hone in on their skills and start to implement some of the things that we do offensively,” Jackson said. “Then obviously (Tuesday) was our first team workout, and I think it went really well. We’ve got a long way to go, but very excited about this group and excited about how eager they are to be coached. They’ve really been so open to the newness of everything, and with 10 new faces that makes it a little easier.”

Summer is a crucial period for development, especially with as many new players as YSU has.

“Summer is always about building a really strong foundation, both on the court and in the weight room,” Jackson said. “We’re really getting after it in the weight room and building our conditioning (because) we want to play much faster. So I think that’s been a huge adjustment for this group. In order to play fast, you gotta train fast, and so they’ve been receptive to that.”

Given the time it takes to learn, Jackson said the Penguins will continue to focus on implementing their offensive system during the rest of the summer.

Then they’ll start to focus on the defense when they come back from their break.

“When it comes down to the timing, the spacing, the passing — everybody’s gotta be on the same page,” Jackson said. “So we’ll be spending a lot of time on our fastbreak, on our half-court offense and then a lot of team bonding.”

At the end of summer, Jackson added that the team will go on retreat off-campus and away from Youngstown before the fall semester begins.

“I’ve always done that. I like to take them away from campus and continue to do some team bonding and really learn each other off the court,” Jackson said. “With so many new faces (among) 16 players, I think it’s imperative that we bond both on and off the court.”

Have an interesting story? Contact Neel Madhavan by email at nmadhavan@tribtoday.com. Follow him on X, formerly Twitter, @NeelMadhavan.