Earning a coach’s trust is crucial for any player. But a sure way to earn women’s basketball coach Sue Guevara’s trust is to perform well under pressure.

And that is what senior guard Angel Chan does by hitting clutch 3-point shots.

“Anytime you have a player who shoots the three as consistently as she does, you spread the defense out more,” Guevara said. “She has really embraced her role more which is just to catch and shoot.”

Before the season started, Guevara met with Chan and gave her the freedom to pick her shots. That is where her “catch and shoot” game began.

“Coach (Guevara) told me that I had the green light to shoot whenever I am open or I could drive,” she said. “She just gave me the freedom to make smart decisions.”

As a result of this meeting, Chan was allowed to excel with her shooting. Her knack for being in the right place at the right time and stepping up when the team needs her has earned the trust of her teammates and coaches.

“Saturday was the first game where I did not tell her that if she did not shoot the ball she was coming out,” Guevara said. “That’s how much I want her to shoot the basketball. She has really embraced that role and it is nice to see her be consistent game to game.”

In CMU’s last game against Western Michigan, Chan went 7-for-9 from the 3-point line en route to a career-high 33 points. Her seven 3-pointers tied for the second most in school history in a game. The performance also earned her Mid-American Conference Player of the Week honors.

Chan ranks second in the Mid-American Conference with 47 made 3-pointers and ranks ninth in the conference in points per game, with 14.5. Guevara thinks it is important to not get caught up in statistics, something Chan tries to do.

“I don’t pay attention to those things, I just play my game,” Chan said. “I don’t even like having that little scoreboard up there that shows my points in the game.”

Chan ranks 15th in the league with 3-point percentage, hitting 36 percent of her attempts. Chan’s .364 3-point average ranks her second among Chippewas who have taken at least 50 attempts.

Guevara loves how tough Chan is and highly admires Chan’s thick skin. She thinks it is important that she knows her role and that she does not get discouraged easily by the first sign of failure.

“When she stops shooting, it is because maybe she has missed a few,” Guevara said. “A slugger doesn’t stop swinging the bat do they; no. I tell her you have got to keep shooting the basketball. I have all the confidence in the world in her.”

Guevara thinks Chan made significant progress in the off-season.

“I talked, earlier in the season, about the commitment that these two seniors made in the summer,” Guevara said. “And now we are seeing some of the benefits of the hard work and improvement from the off-season. She has become more vocal as time goes on and you can see the passion that she has for the game.”

Chan, along with fellow guard Latisha Luckett, are the only two seniors on this season’s team.

Chan has been involved in basketball since elementary school and has been told that her 3-point shot was always been accurate. However, it was not until after her sophomore season that she started to agree.

“Everyone thinks that my shot has been pretty accurate in the past, but I think that my shot has really developed in the last two years,” Chan said. “I always practice it and I think that is where improvement has come from.”

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CMU will go on the road and face No. 6 Iowa on Friday and Boston University on Saturday. CMU heads into the games fresh off a big 7-1 win Sunday against Colgate.

“Winning is always important, the first win of the season is by far the most important,” said senior Moyra Betuzzi. “I don’t think the score really matters, I think just winning last weekend will give us the confidence and motivation to get through this weekend.”

Iowa boasts a defense that has held opponents to only 10 goals in six games, giving the Hawkeyes a 4-2 record, good for third in the Big Ten Conference.

“Iowa is going to be a much better defensive team than Colgate, and they are always a very strong team defensively,” said coach Cristy Freese. “They have a very strong defense and the means their games are going to be close, so breaking through against Iowa will be important and more tough than it was against Colgate.”

The defense is not the only strength that Iowa has. The Hawkeyes also have scored 21 goals in their first six games. Betuzzi thinks the reasoning for the Hawkeyes’ offensive success is their passing abilities.

“We know that they are going to be a fast paced passing team, and we need to just be able to break that up and not get beat individually,” she said. “We just need to step up together as a team to contain them and protect the middle.”

Last season, CMU lost 3-0 against then-No. 3 Iowa. Betuzzi thinks that this CMU team has the experience now to possibly pull off the upset.

“We were a young team last year,” she said. “I think, for us, we are going to have to rely on our experience to get us through. I think experience and not getting into a hole early in the game will be big factors for us this weekend.”

The team is used to playing ranked teams as it has already played against Syracuse earlier this season, which was ranked No. 18 at the time.

“It is always difficult to go against ranked teams,” Betuzzi said. “I also know that in the past we have won against ranked teams before. We just need to not think about them being ranked but instead just as another opponent.”

Last season the team faced eight nationally ranked opponents and even pulled off an upset against then-No. 5 Michigan State.

“I can still remember the feeling of walking out onto the field before Michigan State,” Betuzzi said. “We had nothing to lose and that is kind of the same feeling we want to drive off of this weekend.”

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