SAN DIEGO - The way USD's women's basketball team is talking about the upcoming season you'd think someone revoked their meal cards.
 
"If there's a word to describe our team," said head coach Cindy Fisher, "it would be hungry."
 
It's as if someone locked the Student Life Pavilion doors, removed all the food and banned eating on campus.
 
"There's definitely a hunger," said junior guard Myah Pace.
 
That craving has nothing to do with a growling in the stomach. The famine digs much deeper, to their collective basketball souls and psyche. The Toreros suffered through an injury-marred 2018-19 season. Three players were lost to ACL tears. One suffered a micro fracture. Pace banged her head on the floor in a bizarre accident, suffered a lingering concussion and sat on the bench the final 16 games of the season.
 
As a result, San Diego posted a 9-21 record, only the third losing season in Fisher's 14 years as the Toreros' head coach. Fisher is beginning her 31^stseason as a college coach, 20 as a head coach. In only one other season can she remember suffering such a spate of injuries and that was during her five-year run at Wyoming.
 
"Even then, that probably wasn't to the extent of last year because of the key players who were impacted," said Fisher.
 
If there was a positive to so many players spending hours in the training room it was that other players gained valuable experience. And now, with the Nov. 11 season opener at home against Towson just days away, Fisher has a roster that's versatile, athletic and experienced.
 
Last year's top six scorers all return, with an attitude of wanting to put more W's on the scoreboard.
 
"They're hungry to win. They're extremely focused," said Fisher, who boasts a 262-187 record at USD and has taken San Diego to postseason tournaments seven times. "They're really, really concerned about everyone playing with a 'we' attitude. We have real nice depth. We have real nice athleticism. They're all trying to figure out how we can use all those pieces to be very, very successful."
 
Returning seniors Patricia Brossmann, Madison Pollock and Leticia Soares were San Diego's top three scorers last season, respectively averaging 11.4, 11.2 and 10.3 points. Brossmann, a 6-foot forward from Germany, led the team with 7.6 rebounds. A 6-1 guard, Pollock was second on the team with 6.0 boards per night.
 
The Toreros outrebounded opponents by 2.7 boards per game last season, so crashing the glass shouldn't pose a problem.
 
But where the Toreros figure to be most improved is at point guard. In addition to Pace suffering a season-ending injury, so did backup point guard Ana Ramos. USD had to dig deep to its No. 3 point guard and as a result the team finished with more turnovers (515) than assists (453).
 
Pace can resume her normal spot there now or she might be moved to the two with freshman Ayanna Khalfani indicating in practice she may be ready to push the ball up the floor.
 
Either way, Fisher is blessed with a roster capable of playing the brand of basketball she endorses: in-your-face defense, defense creating turnovers, turnovers leading to fast-break buckets.
 
"It's fun to coach," Fisher said of her style. "I think players like to play fast. I think they like to play a transition game, and the only way to have that happen is to have defense create easy offense. That's what our team has always been about and will always be about."
 
There are four seniors on this year's roster – Ramos, Pollock, Soares and Brossmann. Pace said the underclassmen want this season to be memorable for that foursome, and there's a desire to remove the memory of last year's injury-marred campaign.
 
"We feel like we missed out on last year," said Pace. "We want to get back out there and show that we're confident, we're much stronger, we're healthy and we're back, ready to come for everything we can achieve."