LOUISVILLE, Ky. — The countdown is coming to a close.

The Bellarmine University women's basketball team is set to open the regular season by playing two games in — and serving as host of — this weekend's Midwest Region Crossover. The Knights will make their debut with a 5:30 p.m. (ET) contest Friday against Ohio Dominican before squaring off with Cedarville at 5:30 p.m. Saturday.

Ohio Dominican and Cedarville are both members of the Great Midwest Athletic Conference. In the league's preseason coaches' poll, the Panthers were projected to finish sixth and the Yellow Jackets third in the 13-team conference.

Eighth-ranked Ashland of the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference will also play Cedarville and Ohio Dominican in Knights Hall in the Crossover. Those games will take place at 12:30 p.m. each day.

Bellarmine, representing the Great Lakes Valley Conference, will look to get headed in the right direction from the get-go.

"I do think you set a tone but obviously you're a work in progress and not everything you're going to install is going to be in now," Knights Coach Chancellor Dugan said. "You've got all season to continue building, but obviously we'd love to build from a good start on the opening weekend."

Much like Bellarmine, Ohio Dominican has a lot of production back from last season's 15-14 team. The Panthers return five players who made at least 14 starts, including the team's top, second and fourth leading scorers in guards Alexa Fisher (13.8), Angela Troyer (13.4) and Kennedy Schlabach (9.4). Guard Alli Kern, the team's leading rebounder (6.7), is also back after making 11 starts last season.

"Ohio Dominican was up and down last year, but they had to deal with some key injuries," Dugan said. "They bring back a lot. They'll be real good."

Cedarville is coming off an impressive 23-7 campaign in which the Yellow Jackets earned the three-seed in the G-MAC Tournament. Returning guards Abby Wolford (12.7) and Ashlyn Huffman (12.5) were the team's top two leading scorers last season. Huffman also averaged a team-high 3.9 assists. Forward Alli Roh is back after topping Cedarville in rebounding (5.6). Wolford and Huffman are holdovers from the starting lineup, and Roh and Cameron Peek, another returner, split starts last season.

"Cedarville has always been good," Dugan said. "They seem to reload every year. I expect two really good games."

Bellarmine went 17-12 last year and advanced to the GLVC Tournament finals. The Knights bring back a host of players that went 9-4 starting the final game in January to the conclusion of the season.

Dugan doesn't expect the Knights to look like a finished product — far from it — but she does expect her squad to get after it and believe they can overcome the shaky spurts that are bound to happen at the outset of a new season.

"You want to be sharp, but this early it's never going to be as sharp as you want it to be. You can have an edge to you, though," Dugan said. "The effort and confidence should already be there. You should be ready to get in there and have that mentality of 'Let's make a statement.' "

This will be Bellarmine's final season in Division II before the Knights transition to DI and the ASUN Conference. As far as their approach this season, the Knights only look far enough ahead to see what's right in front of them.

"We just talk about who we're playing, what's the next game," Dugan said.

In other words, Ohio Dominican and Cedarville have been the center of discussion.

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