(Editor's note: UC Santa Barbara junior forward Erin Buescher will share a weekly diary with ESPN.com throughout the season. For more on the Gauchos, visit UCSB's official athletic site.)

Dec. 1, 1999

The Preseason WNIT ended on a sour note, losing by 20 points to Georgia. It was an embarrassing experience for us, and we are looking forward to getting back on the winning track.

	Erin Buescher, right, averaged 17.3 points and 9.7 rebounds last season.

With a few days off from school for the Thanksgiving holiday, we were able to concentrate more on basketball. We had Thursday completely off and I went over to a friend's house for Thanksgiving dinner and had a fantastic time. Saturday we had a late practice, which consisted of turning in our hoop shoes for track shoes. We ran, and ran, and ran some more. Then the coaches got tired of telling us to run, so they brought the basketballs out.

The travel has been difficult so far this season. We have never had a schedule with so much travel in such a short period of time in my three years at UCSB. First, we went to Illinois for five days, and now we're going straight to Kansas from Arizona for a tournament this weekend. It is hard being away from school for so long, especially after a holiday.

A positive, however, is that we are really able to bond as a team. It has been great traveling with the freshmen, because they are a lot of fun and good sports for getting razzed so much by the upperclassmen. For instance, Jess Hansen forgot to bring her shoes to practice while we were in Illinois, and we have stolen her stuffed animal (a green cucumber named Larry) more than once.

We played Arizona last night (Tuesday) and lost for the third year in a row. Arizona is definitely one of the best teams we will play all year. Playing on the road is good for us because it prepares us for the postseason. Playing against good teams in front of a lot of fans, like Illinois last week, will help us to be ready come March.

I don't know much about Kansas yet, but I was teammates with Lynn Pride two summers ago when I played with the U.S. Jones Cup team in Beijing, China and Taipei, Taiwan. She is a very skilled player, one of the top players in the country, and it should be fun to play against her.