Editor's note: Oklahoma's Stacey Dales, a Kodak All-American in 2000-01, will share a weekly diary with ESPN.com throughout the season.

Nov. 26, 2001

Practice was good today. Over the weekend, we found several more things we needed to work on, and we accomplished that today. I got a cold while I was down in San Antonio, where it was warmer. You would think something like that wouldn't happen. The weather was great and we had some time to enjoy ourselves. San Antonio was a nice break from school and from Norman. I was able to go out to dinner with Chris, my fiancé, and his family while we were there and they came to the games as well.

	Stacey Dales was the 2000-01 Big 12 Player of the Year.

On Thursday, the team had an awesome Thanksgiving dinner at our hotel. Coach Coale told us to be smart and not to gorge too much because we had practice on Thursday afternoon, but we all just ate. You only get Thanksgiving once a year, you know. I had turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, brussels sprouts and a seafood concoction of some sort. For dessert, I had bread pudding, cherry pie and a little bit of pumpkin pie.

We had a good time at the tournament, but it was nice to come back home. We will be here for a while, with our first home games this week. The home stand will be good because of finals coming up. Most of my finals just consist of essays and writing, so I will be spending a lot of time in the library. Fortunately, all of my exams were bumped up because we got through the material early. It will also be nice to play in front of our own fans for a change and on our own court.

The teams we're playing this week will be pretty tough, but I think that's typical of all the teams on our schedule. TCU is supposed to be good this year and Wichita State beat Oklahoma State. TCU was voted to be one of the most underrated teams by Nancy Lieberman. They have two tall girls, but we will handle their height like we have handled the size of all the teams we have played so far this season.

We have to be smarter and have more focus and concentration in order to overcome our lack of size. The good thing is that Shannon Selmon is back on the court. She has been so patient this past month and a half but so eager to get back into the game. She's a valuable part of the team because of her team morale and strength. She's one of the strongest players on the team. We need her presence and she's a smart player.

We hope to see you out at the games this week and throughout the next few weeks. It should be an exciting year for OU women's basketball.

For more on Stacey Dales and the Sooners, visit Oklahoma's official athletic site.