NCAA Tournament

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I don't think there's a separate thread on the NCAA women's tournament so I'll just exult a bit here at Rutgers and LSU winning their regionals - Rutgers edged my sentimental favorite Duke (who only had one loss in the season till Rutgers kicked them out of the tournament) and then absolutely pounded ASU, and LSU humbled UCONN, one of the perennial women's college basketball powers - and this after LSU has been through a tumultuous coaching change.

Let's see if Tennessee survives this rout of top-ranked teams tonight.

 

Ole Miss has a high powered offense, but only a mediocre defense -- and no solution for their Candice Parker dilemma. As much as I would love to see Tennessee knocked out, I don't think Ole Miss will get Tennessee to shift the pace of the game in Ole Miss' favor.

The game to watch is Purdue-North Carolina. Latta has proved over and over again she is the ultimate clutch player. She's fun to watch. However, on the other side you have the hottest player in the tournament -- Gearlds is going to be tough to stop.

 

Well, Tennessee dominated and UNC ultimately survived, though there were moments when I had my doubts - didn't get to watch the whole game, though.

And now, Goestenkors (sp?), the Duke women's coach, is talking to Texas about going there. Hmm.

 

I'm intrigued to see how Oden does against Noah, Richard and Horford.

I wonder how Green will do against Conley, as Collison threw Green way out of his game tonight.

 

Well, the men's championship involves two teams I really didn't want to see get there - not sure I'll watch it.

And the women's championship, as of about 2 seconds ago, matches Rutgers (they've had an amazing championship run and totally disassembled LSU tonight) and Tennessee, who had to really struggle to get back on UNC - they were down 11 at one point and shooting cold. Rutgers has been very hot, but Tennessee has the power, the tradition, and the program. Women's final should be very interesting.

On the whole, a good tournament, with plenty of close games and enough surprises to keep me tuning in.

 

Well it seems despite a powerful performance by Oden and the domination of Noah, Richard and Horford by Oden, the rest of Ohio State just couldn't do anything to compliment the big guy.

 

Yeah, Florida repeats. I watched only part of it and discovered I was cheering for Ohio State. Odd how I figure out who I support while I'm watching.

BTW, the team I wanted to win has never won when they played on my birthday. Hmmmm.

And, editing on April 4, Tennessee won the women's national championship for the 7th time. Though I have lived in Tennessee for more than a decade, I am officially Not From Around Here (my grandfather wasn't born here, don't you know) so I have to admit I was secretly pulling for Rutgers, who had such an amazing run in the tournament. But Tennessee turned out to be too much for them.

Hats off to Pat Summitt, who has dominated the women's basketball scene for a long, long time.

[ April 04, 2007, 16:58: Message edited by: revmaf ]

 

And the final footnote to the women's championship - Gail Goestenkors is leaving Duke for Texas.

What if . . . they had beat Rutgers and won the championship? Would she have stayed at Duke?

I think not, actually. Texas is a great opportunity, and now she can have a whole new challenge to work on for years before she retires.

And Duke will have a tricky recruitment job to replace her. Not least because recruiting athletes for Duke is tricky, because they have to actually be students . . .

Well. Farewell, 2007 championships.