Lady Dogs still have something to prove
SOUTH BEND, Ind. — Finding ways to overcome adversity is a common theme for three of the four teams in the South Bend bracket of the NCAA women’s basketball tournament.
Eighth-seeded Georgia (21-9), which had its string of consecutive NCAA appearances snapped at 20 last season, started 2-5 in the Southeastern Conference under first-year coach Joni Taylor before winning seven of its last nine regular-season games this year. Ninth-seeded Indiana (20-11), which is making its first NCAA tournament appearance since 2002, lost five of seven games from late December to mid-January.
They’ll play at 9 EDT tonight in South Bend, with either Georgia or Indiana advancing to a Monday matchup against the winner of today’s 6:30 p.m. game between Lexington Regional No. 1 seed Notre Dame ( 31-1) and 16th-seeded North Carolina A&T (19-11).
Georgia’s tough stretch included three losses to ranked opponents, with both wins coming against ranked teams. Taylor said she talked to her players before conference play began about what could happen if things didn’t go as they hoped.
“So, yes, we were very disappointed in how we started,” Taylor said. “But I don’t think it was a shock, either. Because they were prepared for a tough start. We knew we had to stay the course and trust ourselves and trust the work we had put in all summer, all preseason, all nonconference to know we were a good team and if we continued to fight and stay together we could crawl ourselves out of that hole.”
Both the Lady Bulldogs — who lost second- leading scorer Shacobia Barbee to a season-ending ankle injury on Feb. 21 — and Indiana were knocked out in the opening games of their conference tournaments.
Lady Bulldogs senior guard Marjorie Butler said that overtime loss to Vanderbilt gives the team motivation.
“It is almost like we have a little more left to prove,” she said.
Second-year Indiana coach Teri Moren said the Hoosiers being in the tournament for the first time in 14 years is special.
“You’ve got to get a taste of it first before you know what it’s all about,” she said.
North Carolina A&T didn’t look much like an NCAA tournament team when it started the season 0- 4. Things didn’t look much brighter after a loss at Coppin State in late January dropped the Aggies to 9-10, but they won five in a row and 10 of their last 11 to earn the third NCAA berth in the program’s history.
The host Fighting Irish, seeking their sixth straight Final Four appearance, are the only team in South Bend that looked like a tournament lock all season long.