It may have lost a successful head coach to a bigger school, but the Eastern women’s basketball team promoted last year’s associate head coach and added a new wrinkle to its motion offense.

Lee Buchanan will be the one leading the Panthers’ program this season, after spending six years under former head coach Brady Sallee at Eastern. Sallee accepted a job at Ball State this summer.

Buchanan, being one of Sallee’s coaching pupils, said he’ll run the same four-out, one-in motion offense this season.

But Buchanan is trying to add a new dimension to it by moving senior forward Mariah King from the center position to power forward to make up for the athleticism the team lost at the position with the graduation of Chantelle Pressley.

“It’s exciting,” King said. “It gives me an advantage because I’m faster than a lot of (centers).”

Buchanan said putting King at the “four spot” should create matchup problems, as she’ll be one of the four playing from the outside in.

If King can be in a position where an opponent’s center may have to guard her, that’s the Panthers’ best matchup, Buchanan said.

“(Mariah) getting comfortable facing the basket on the perimeter and then going back to putting her back to the basket will help her game,” Buchanan said.

King will be in a combination mix with sophomore forward Sabina Oroszova and junior forward Taryn Olson – both Oroszova and Olson can play the center position; in fact, Buchanan said Olson is a true center.

Ideally, this shift to power forward will help King have her best season, Buchanan said. King’s predecessors at the center position, Maggie Kloak and Rachel Galligan, had their best seasons during their senior campaign.

Kloak averaged a career-high 12.3 points per game in her senior season and Galligan scored a career-high 582 points in her last year, although she averaged more than 17.6 points per game in a prior season.

“Mariah, mentally, is ready to have her breakout season,” Buchanan said. “She approached the year knowing this is it and she wants to have a good going out party. She challenged herself.”

King said she has put herself in a spot to have her best season after a summer of staying in shape and working on her shot – especially from beyond the arc.

King will have to stay out of foul trouble, though, Buchanan said. She led the team with 91 personal fouls and three foul-outs last year. The key is to keep her in games.

If she fouls fewer times and is able to stay in games longer, she will have to be more consistent. She averaged 27 minutes per game last year, third among starters, but Buchanan expects to see her playing around 30 minutes.

King’s consistency issue was evident in January last season when she scored a career-high 30 points against Southeast Missouri, then was held scoreless the next game against Tennessee-Martin.

But King won’t be stuck at the power forward position, Buchanan said.

He said he plans on using her at both low-post positions.

And for the most part, the Panthers roster looks no different than it did last season. The team lost Pressley to graduation and Jessica Parker, who averaged three points per game last season, transferred to Southern Indiana.

Senior forward Sydney Mitchell, one of the returning starters, said having so many players returning adds some pressure to the team.

“You always want to end on a good note and go out with a bang,” Mitchell said.

The Panthers have this season to try to go as far as they can with this senior class, which includes Mitchell, King, Ta’Kenya Nixon and Kelsey Wyss – most of whom have been three-year starters, at least.

“They look like a veteran combination,” Buchanan said. “When those veterans are together, they do some things and you say, ‘Wow, that looks really good.’”

Buchanan said the flow of the four seniors comes from playing together for so long, but Nixon said they’ll have to get some chemistry back because they haven’t played together since March.

“Considering a week after (Sunday’s exhibition game) we start playing games that really count, it’s important to get a flow going and get to know each other a little bit more,” Nixon said.

It will be especially important to get a feeling for the new players – even the ones who have been on campus, but will see increased playing time.

“People think this is a machine and we just do this every year, but when we put the balls away they don’t run our system again until October,” Buchanan said.

The Panthers have only had about 20 practices, Buchanan said, and like most teams, they’re trying to find rhythm heading into the season.

Mitchell said Sunday’s exhibition game against Illinois-Springfield will help the team see where it’s at with its rhythm.

The season will officially begin Nov. 9 on the road against Indiana State in Terre Haute, Ind.

Alex McNamee can be reached at 581-2812 or [email protected].