Exhibition games may not count toward regular season records. But the way the women’s basketball team is preparing, you’d never know it.

“I’m not gonna approach it any differently,” sophomore forward Aishah Sutherland said. “I’m gonna play it like every other game — I’m gonna work hard.”

Kansas will play host to Emporia State Sunday at 2 p.m. as a final test before the official start of the regular season. After finishing 26-6 last season, the Lady Hornets are ranked No. 7 in the WBCA/USA Today/ESPN preseason coaches poll. The team has spent 90 consecutive weeks in the Division II top 25.

The Lady Hornets are led by Cassondra Boston, who averaged 14.9 points per game last season.

“The Boston kid tore us up two years ago,” coach Bonnie Henrickson said.

Though last week’s 86-56 bashing of Pittsburg State looked pretty on paper, the off-season cobwebs were still hanging around. Last week’s dominating offensive display, most notably from sophomore forward Aishah Sutherland and senior guard Danielle McCray, helped camouflage a glaring weakness: 20 turnovers.

Henrickson said there was no excuse for 20 turnovers.

However, Kansas did negate more than half of these errors with 11 total steals. That’s further evidence that a suffocating defense can open up so much for a juggernaut offense.

“Steals and turnovers get us in numbers where we’ve got two on one, three on one, three on two,” Henrickson said. “Those lead to high percentage shots.”

If Kansas can open up an early lead like they did last weekend, Henrickson will once again have the ability to allocate some valuable minutes to her bench.

Co-captain and junior forward Nicolette Smith were tied for second in playtime on the team with 23 minutes played, but the younger players also got a little taste of college ball.

“It’s experience for the young kids, just getting an opportunity to play with a crowd and in their uniforms,” Henrickson said.

Freshman guard Monica Engelman may have benefited the most from the lead, logging 12 of her 16 minutes in the second half.

“I think for my first game, I did all right,” Engelman said. “I just took it as a learning experience.”

Engelman said that she got a little anxious in her debut, forcing some shots that she normally would never take

“The pace is obviously completely different,” Engelman said. “There’s a lot more people here. It’s a different atmosphere.”

No matter who is in there, starters or reserves, a main focus will be on playing consistently solid defense.

“Before you can even think about offense, you need to play defense,” Sutherland said.

Kansas will be all business this Sunday. This one counts more than it shows.

“It prepares us and makes it more game-like,” Henrickson said.

— Edited by Adam Mowder