Women's Hoops Blog

Inane commentary on a game that deserves far better


Monday, March 31, 2008

No upsets or real surprises from Sunday's action.

A Big East showdown in Greensboro will happen tomorrow night, thanks largely to Maya Moore and Brittany Hunter from UConn and Essence Carson from Rutgers.

Talking about the Huskies after her team lost, ODU coach Wendy Larry had this to say:

"This is like playing the perfect storm. UConn is so deep. Their transition game is just so good. You have to play the perfect game to compete against them, to beat them. You have to get all the hustle points, the loose balls. You have to make all of your shots. We played with a great deal of passion, but we didn't play with the energy needed."

If you missed the game, you may want to check out the live updates from UConn's student paper.

For Rutgers, they are happy to still be alive but were not happy with their performance (except for what Carson did).

"Essence looked like she wasn't willing to go home and call it a day," said C. Vivian Stringer. "She probably realized that not many people were on. In fact, nobody else was on."

In Oklahoma City, Texas A&M continued their magical run by taking care of Duke 77-63. With Danielle Gant out for the second half from dehydration, Patrice Reado took her coach's halftime challenge to heart and scored 17 points to help her team advance. But she was not alone as the "Little General" also did most of her scoring damage in the second half.

"I felt I had to step up along with all my teammates to pick the slack without her,” Takia Starks said. "But the bottom line is we're a team, first thing first.”

In the last game of the round, Candace Parker tied her career high and made sure that Notre Dame remained winless against the Lady Vols. Once again it was a half time speech from the coach that fired up the players.

"At halftime, Coach was just real with us," senior Nicky Anosike said. "There was no more sugar coating. She just told us we win or we go home and none of us wanted to go home.