WOMEN'S BASKETBALL: Irish, Huskies on collision course for title game
By TIM CASEY
Assistant Sports Editor
Since Notre Dame stunned Connecticut on Jan. 15, both teams have pointed towards the Big East Championships. Provided the two top seeds win two more games, a rematch would occur on Tuesday night before the usual sell-out crowd at Gampel Pavilion, the Huskies home floor.
Think Geno Auriemma is looking forward for another shot at the Irish?
Following his team's loss at the Joyce Center, Auriemma voiced his squad's dilemmas.
"I think our team is surprised when teams actually play really, really good against us," Auriemma said. "That's how immature some of our players are. They would rather phone ahead and say `By the way, here we come and we would like the score to be 52-30 at halftime so could you please go along with that?' And when it doesn't go like that, we're not quite sure how to deal with it this year. That's the crux of what we're going through right now."
Due to that loss, Connecticut (25-2 overall, 15-1 in the Big East) enters the conference tournament as the No. 2 seed. Notre Dame (26-1 overall, 15-1 in the Big East) is the top seed and opens up on Sunday at 2:00. The Irish play the winner of Saturday's game between Georgetown and Syracuse.
Notre Dame beat Georgetown 65-53 on Feb. 24 in its final home game and defeated Syracuse 75-61 on Feb. 14 in New York. Both squads are led by All-Conference guards — Georgetown's Katie Smrcka-Duffy is second in the league in scoring with 16.7 points per game. And Syracuse's Beth Record is averaging 13.3 points per game, good for 11th in the Big East.
"They both have some outstanding post players and they both have a great guard," coach Muffet McGraw said. "They have multiple players who played very well against us."
If the Irish win on Sunday, they will play on Monday night at 6 p.m. against No. 4 Virginia Tech, No. 5 Villanova or No. 12 St. John's. Virginia Tech received a bye and plays the winner of the Villanova/St. John's match-up on Sunday.
As has been the case for most of the year, McGraw will rely on the five starters for the bulk of the minutes. Ruth Riley leads the league in scoring (18.5 points), blocked shots (3.19 per game) and field-goal percentage (63.6 percent) and ranks fourth in rebounds (7.5 per game).
Niele Ivey will also likely receive All-Big East honors. She has averaged 12.3 points, 7.04 assists and 2.63 steals per game.
For the first two games, depending on the score, McGraw wants to give her bench players some playing time.
"I'd like to keep (the starters) under 30 minutes," McGraw said. "Hopefully we'll be able to spread the time around."
If they advance to the finals, look for the Irish to stick with five or six players. In the previous Connecticut game, Notre Dame's starters played for 184 of a possible 200 minutes.
Connecticut, the defending national champions, begins play on Sunday against either Boston College or Miami. In Monday's semifinals, the Huskies will likely face Rutgers. The Scarlet Knights handed the Irish their only loss of the season on Feb. 17 but lost 70-45 to Connecticut on Feb. 14.
"Rutgers is a great defensive team," McGraw said. "But Connecticut has such good depth. It should be a good game"
All Sports Stories for Friday, March 2, 2001
