File photo WVU’s Sydney Shaw puts up a jumper during a game against Kansas State last season.

MORGANTOWN — As it is with so many collegiate basketball teams in this transitory era, West Virginia’s talented women’s basketball team is undergoing a face lift.

Over the past few years, the face of the program has been JJ Quinerly but she has taken her smile to the WNBA where she is making a strong impact as a rookie while her West Virginia coach, Mark Kellogg, is reshaping both his offense and defense.

And what is emerging in these early summer workouts is a one-two punch of point guard Jordan Harrison, the only player left from just two seasons ago, and a transfer from Auburn a season back in Sydney Shaw who isn’t being intended to be the next JJ Quinerly but instead to create an impact of her own.

“I think they are working well,” Kellogg said during a midday Tuesday media session. “They are playing with and without the ball. Shaw will probably handle the ball more than she has in the past. We have a couple more who can handle it and get Jordan off of the ball from time to time, but it’s still going to be Jordan handling the show 85% of the time.”

Harrison has proven herself in all areas of the game but will draw a lot more attention with Quinerly gone, so Shaw has to step her game up to new levels to make things work with the efficiency they had with Quinerly.

“The continuity and the trust,” Kellogg said, is what they are honing. “Shaw wants a bigger role and that was very important for her. I think she’s playing at a high level, shooting at a high level, shooting the 3, working on finishing at the rim.

She came as a scorer and averaged 11.4 points a game last season, but admittedly wasn’t sold on defense and Kellogg’s identity is with a full-court, pressure, hard-working defense.

So why did she transfer here?

“What intrigued me was that Kellogg had a plan for me … what I was good at, what I needed to work on, and he kept all his promises. I mean, here I was, I hadn’t even committed yet and he had all this who you are as a player written out in front of him showed he really wanted me.

“I wanted to go where I was really wanted.”

And so she bought into the program and adjusted as Harrison and Quinerly carried the defensive load, Quinerly being the league’s top defender and now is ready to make her own defensive impression

“She took huge steps defensively from where she was at this time last year. I’m really excited for Sydney Shaw,” Kellogg said. “She will like that I’m bragging on her on the defensive end.”

Kellogg has a lot to do with why he is able to brag on her defensive play.

“In the post-season meetings we had to go through what we felt was wrong and what we could do better and then he would tell us, ‘No, that’s off.’ He showed me that I was a better defender than I thought I was. He had clips and statistics and I was like, ‘OK, I never really thought that.’ What he showed me made me a better defender.”

But with her in Quinerly’s role this year, you may see a scoring breakout from her, Harrison believes.

“I think Sydney is more creative than she was able to show last year. I think she can get to the mid-range shot, create her own shot pretty easily, so I don’t think it will change much. There will be a lot more ball movement because we don’t have someone like JJ who can break down her defender every single time,” she said.

Certainly, Shaw has taken an analytical approach to her new role and to trying to take steps up that will lessen the effect of Quinerly’s departure.

“I definitely honed in on the mistakes I continuously made,” Shaw said. “Why was I feeling in my head that the game was so fast when I was messing up? I was looking at different situations and what I would do, what I actually did and what I should have done. I wanted to fix those mistakes.”

Studying one’s bad plays is not a fun experience.

“It’s rough,” Shaw said. “You’re looking and thinking ‘Why would I do that?’ It’s a rough watch, but it has to be done. Sometimes I just want to shut it down and keep going, but you have to do it to get better.”

What Shaw has decided upon offensively is that she has to get to the rim more rather than settling for so much outside shooting.

“Me and Kellogg talk a lot of times about ‘rim first.’ I know I can shoot, so why wouldn’t I shoot? A lot of times when I get the ball I shoot it, but if I can’t get a shot off my opportunity to drive to the rim is gone. So, I’m thinking rim first and attacking can open my shot up more,” Shaw said.

“I can also get my assists up that way and help Jordan more.”