Lady Owls #9 In NJCAA Preseason Rankings Following Back-to-Back National Championship Appearances

Following another season as NJCAA Region 20 Division III Champions, District Champions, and a trip to the National Championship, the Prince George's Community College women's basketball program starts the 2023-24 season as the #9 program in the DIII preseason rankings. This marks the second year in a row the Owls begin the year in the preseason polls after entering at #9 to begin the 2022 season as well.

Head coach Devin May will again look to reload for the upcoming year, his third at the helm of the program during which he's compiled a 33-16 (.673) overall record. This year's squad will look a bit different from the past two seasons which featured his first recruiting class, all of whom have since returned for their sophomore campaigns which included several All-Region and All-MD JUCO players, along with a few All-American selections by the time their playing careers in an Owls uniform came to an end.

The sole returner from last year's team is sophomore Danielle Ellerbee (Clinton, MD/Surrattsville) who averaged nearly 23 minutes per game as the first option off the bench for the Owls. Ellerbee also logged four starts on the year, one of which came in the team's District Championship win and two others during the National Championship. Joining her as a second year Owl will be RaMyah Yearwood (Gambrills, MD/Arundel) who returns as a member of Prince George's 2021-22 squad where she started in all 25 games for Prince George's. Ellerbee and Yearwood will be looked to often, especially early in the year as coach May looks to build his team's identity for 2023-24.

The Owls will be put to the test this year as they're now the only DIII program in Maryland JUCO after Anne Arundel moved to DII over the summer. Currently the team is slated to play 22 regular season games with just 8 being played against other divisional opponents. Coach May has proven his team will be up to the challenge, posting a respectable 13-12 record over DI and DII opponents since taking over the program.

Up first for Prince George's is a top-15 matchup to kick off the year when the team travels to Bethleham, PA to take on #12 Northampton Community College on Saturday, November 4^th. The Owls have seen Northampton's Spartans almost as often as any other program over the past couple of years, defeating the Spartans twice in 2022-23. The first Owls victory came during Prince George's home-opener and the second took place at the National Championship which ended Northampton's season. Saturday's tip-off is scheduled for 1 PM.