Cardinal Season Comes to an End, Losses to Connecticut in National Semi-Finals

Photo Credit: USA Today Sports

By: Joe Lami

The Stanford Cardinal played their final game of the 2013-2014 season on Sunday night after they were defeated by Connecticut 75-56 in Nashville.  The Cardinal were seeking their third National Championship in school history and their first one since 1992, however they fell short in their sixth trip to the final four in the past seven years.  Sunday also marks the third time in four years that the Cardinal have fallen in the National Semi-Final.

The Cardinal controlled much of the first half.  The Huskies got on the board first with buckets from Bria Hartley and Moriah Jefferson to go up 4-0.  Chiney Ogwumike got on the board first for the Cardinal with a jumper of her own.  Connecticut would get the lead back up to four, until Stanford went on a 7-0 run to give them their first lead of the evening with 16:09 remaining in the half.  The Cardinal held the lead for 12 minutes until Stephanie Dolson tied it up at 22 with four minutes remaining.  The 12 minutes marked the longest stretch of time this season that Connecticut had trailed.  Stanford pushed their largest lead to six, marking the second highest lead a team had on Connecticut all season.  The Huskies continued their run, extending it to 14-0 before Stanford was able to answer with a bucket of their own.  UConn went into the half with a 28-24 lead.

Stanford fell apart in the second half, as Connecticut started the second half with a 5:46 16-3 run.  The three points came from a rare three-pointer from Ogwumike.  The run would be give enough of a lead for UConn to ride out the win.  The Cardinal wouldn’t be able to fight their way back.

Amber Orrange led the way for the Cardinal with 16 points, she also added five assists in the losing effort.  Ogwumike wrapped up her Stanford career with her 25^th double double of the season, as the expected 1^st overall pick in the upcoming WNBA Draft finished the game with 15 points and ten rebounds.  Lili Thompson wrapped up the double figure Cardinal scorers with 12 points, eight of which came in the first half.

The Huskies saw all five of their starters get into double figures.  Player of the Year nominee, Brianna Stewart led the way with 18 points.  Kaleena Mosqueda-Lewis contributed 15 points, all of which came in the second half.  Hartley shot four of 12 from the field to finish with 14 points.  Both Jefferson and Dolson finished the game with ten points each to cap off the double digits scorers.  Kiah Stokes also came off of the bench to add nine points in 22 minutes played, as the Huskies used only six players in 39-minutes of the game.  In the last minute, substitutes Saniya Chong, Tierney Lawlor, Briana Pulido and Brianna Banks replaced the starting five.

Connecticut remains undefeated at 39-0 and advance to their school’s ninth National Championship.  Next up for the Huskies is another undefeated team in Notre Dame (37-0), who beat Maryland 81-67 in the other National Semi-Final game.  Tuesday will mark the first time ever, where two undefeated teams will battle it out for the National Title.  Connecticut also joins their men’s team in the National Championship, as the men’s team will be going up against Kentucky for the men’s title.  Both Connecticut team’s won the title in 2004, and have a chance to do it again just ten years later.  They remain the only school to accomplish the feat.

Stanford finishes their season with a record of 30-4 and some uncertainty in next season, as it will be the first one since 2008 where an Ogwumike will not be on the team.

 

For UW’s Tuiasosopo, the Fight Hunger Bowl is the singular challenge

By Morris Phillips

Washington’s plenty talented enough to hang with the BYU Cougars in the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl on tap at AT&T Park.  But with Head Coach Steve Sarkisian saying yes to USC and leaving Seattle after five seasons to coach the Trojans, one has to wonder what will be the collective mindset of the Huskies’ student-athletes when they hit the field on Friday night.

Could the Huskies feel spurned by Sarkisian, or be distracted by all the upheaval?  Or will a talented UW team leap to the challenge of attempting to win a ninth game in a season for the first time since 2000 when interim coach Marques Tuiasosopo led the Huskies to a 34-24 win over Purdue and Drew Brees in the Rose Bowl?

“You’d like to think every close team… would handle it the same way, but you just never know until you go through it,” Tuiasosopo said.  “I think our seniors have done a nice job, and I think our underclassmen have done a nice job of buying into what the seniors are talking about and staying focused on the task at hand.”

One thing’s for certain: the 34-year old Tuiasosopo is the point man for the Huskies’ mindset approaching kickoff on Friday night.  The UW legend, former Raider and son of Manu, the starting nose tackle for the 49ers in their second Super Bowl victory over Miami in 1985, is a rising star in the coaching profession.  In just five short years after retiring from the NFL in 2008, Tuiasosopo has gone from assistant strength coach at UW, to position coach at UCLA under Jim Mora, to quarterback coach and now interim head coach back at Washington with Sarkisian leaving and Boise State’s Chris Peterson set to take control of the Huskies following the bowl game.

And if Tuiasosopo can exude calm, excitement and anticipation for the meeting with BYU, why wouldn’t the players?  The interim coach’s situation couldn’t be any less unsettled than his team’s with a gaggle of UW assistants already gone to join Sarkisian in Los Angeles, and Peterson reportedly set to hire Jonathan Smith, his quarterbacks coach at Boise State, for the same position in Seattle.   Tuisasosopo might be a natural fit on Peterson’s staff in any capacity, or he could take his three week stint as head man and run with it… possibly to a head job at a non-BCS school looking to corral the unbridled energy of a promising, youthful coach.

Undoubtedly, Tuisasosopo and the Huskies will get just one shot together.  In BYU, the Huskies will face a staunch defensive team led by senior linebacker Kyle Van Noy that also features a power running attack led by dual threat quarterback Taysom Hill.  The Huskies will counter with oft-injured but supremely talented quarterback Keith Price and power back Bishop Sankey, who rushed for over 1,700 yards in the regular season.

The game figures to be high scoring and close; one requiring quick-twitch decisions and gutsy play calls, rigorous work for even the most seasoned of coaches. Not only will Tuisasosopo face all those challenges, he’ll do it with an unfamiliar staff.  Meanwhile BYU Head Coach Bronco Mendenhall has held the position for nine seasons and has made bowl appearances all nine times.  The contrast in experience couldn’t be more striking.

Still Tuisasosopo faces his challenge with enthusiasm and a keen eye on his alma mater’s history.  Price and safety Will Shamburger are the only remaining players from the 2009 recruiting the class that committed on the heels of the 0-12 season in 2008, the last under Coach Tyrone Willingham.  Tuisasopo referred to the 2008 season as the lowest point in the history of the school earlier this week.  Given that, Tuiasosopo frames the challenge of chasing a watershed ninth win on Friday as an historic quest.  And that’s what experienced coaches do: set goals and demand myopic focus on them.

“Now we’re at 8-4 and my hope… is that the young guys really focus on that, not everything else,” Tuiasosopo said.

And behind those goals are the players, committed to one coach who left and being asked to devote themselves to another… almost overnight.  Needless to say, according to Tuisasosopo, it can be confusing.

“They’re growing to become men, and sometimes they need to know ‘Hey, I totally understand what you’re going through.  They need someone there to help them through and manage and navigate their emotions through this process,” Tuiasosopo said.

Morris Phillips on the NCAA: Former Raider Tuiasosopo to coach Hunger Bowl for Washington

by Morris Phillips

SAN FRANCISCO–The Kraft Hunger Bowl is back and kick off is scheduled for Sat December 28th at AT&T Park between BYU and Washington University. Friday night I was in downtown S.F. and ran into the BYU advance crew. The Cougars don’t arrive in the City until Sunday. The Cougars former head coach Lavelle Edwards was in town on Friday night.

There’s a lot of excitment downtown it’s BYU’s first appearance in the Kraft Bowl and it’s Washington’s also. It should be a great football game. BYU is having a great season. The Cougars lost games during the regular season to Wisconsin and Notre Dame. BYU is a good football team and they run the football.

Washington runs the football just as well with their running back Bishop Sankey and the Huskies are 8-12 for the regular season in the Pac 12. Then there was the coaching change for Washington as Steve Sarkisian who left for USC is replaced by Chris Peterson. Sarkisian will not be involved in this game.

Peterson left Boise State to coach the Huskies and with the Hunger Bowl in the last couple years there have been coaching changes for this game. It will not affect the product on the field it should be an exciting game. Former Raider quarterback Marques Tuiasosopo the Huskies interim coach knows the system going into this bowl game. It’s all hands on deck with Sarkisian gone and the team has to rally around the new coach for this game.

The players have to be more attentive and the assistants have to assume the responsibilty it’s not going to affect them on the field. They’ve got plenty of time to prepare and they might be able to do well without Sarkisian for this game. What happened two years ago with Illinois they came into the bowl to play UCLA with their new coach and last year a coaching change happened when Boston College came town and they also had a new coach.

That’s just the kind of timing they have in football and particuarily with this bowl game coaches are taking new jobs at this time of the year and obviously athletic directors are not interested in having somebody around whose accepted a new job who can not even coach the last few games. They get the guy out and he doesn’t coach the final bowl games and they just move on.

It shouldn’t effect Washington at all with this change and again Peterson will take over at the beginning of next season and coach the Huskies 2014 season. Peterson maybe attending this game as an observer. He might be there as a consultant but Peterson left Boise State and it’s great for Washington he was an excellent coach while he was with the Buffaloes and made a couple of BCS appearences.

Morris Phillips is filling in for Michelle Richardson this week for NCAA commentary

Number One Ranked Connecticut Hands Stanford First Loss of the Season

 

By: Joe Lami

The Stanford Cardinal went into Monday night’s match with a record of 1-0 after the season opener win over Boston College. However, they will not move to 2-0, after a loss to the Huskies by the final score of 76-57.  Stanford went into Storrs looking to knockoff UConn and get their revenge from last season’s embarrassing loss to the Huskies at home.  Stanford also wanted to upset the preseason number one for the second straight year, after last season’s victory over Baylor by two points in Hawaii, but UConn prevented that from coming to reality.

Both teams started the game especially cold, as the first bucket wasn’t knocked down until a minute eighteen into the game by Husky star, Bria Hartley.  Stanford would then answer back just ten seconds later with their first bucket of the night from freshman Kailee Johnson.  This was the last bucket for over five minutes, as both teams struggled from the field, as the next bucket wouldn’t be made until Chiney Ogumike hit her first of the night at the 13:13 mark.  UConn would retake the lead after Saniya Chong came off the bench to knock down a three, but that was short lived as Ogumike would retake the lead for the Cardinal, 6-5 with 12:39 remaining in the first half.  Almost another minute would go by until the next basket was made, this time a three again by Husky guard Chong.  The Husky lead was 8-6 with just under 12 minutes to go in the half.  The lead wouldn’t be changed again, as Connecticut didn’t look back on their way to victory.

For Stanford, Amber Orrange led the way with 22 points, Ogumike followed with 16.  It was another strong showing for the pre-season All-American Ogumike, as she recorded another double-double with 13 rebounds, ten of those coming in the first half.

Connecticut spread the ball around really well with 3 players scoring more than ten points, and another three recording nine points.

The difference makers in Monday night’s contest came in a couple of different ways, all of them, favoring the Huskies.  The biggest came in the way of bench points as the UConn bench out scored the Stanford bench 27-12.  Connecticut also had only ten turnovers compared to the Cardinal 16. UConn out scored Stanford at the foul line 19-12 and hit four more three-pointers than the girls from Palo Alto.  The Huskies were also really strong inside the paint as they blocked a total of eight shots, six of them coming from Kiah Stokes, who came off of the bench and added ten points as well.

There was however, a big scare for the Huskies as one of their star players in Kaleena Mosqueda-Lewis hit the ground hard fighting for a rebound landing awkwardly on her right arm.  Gampel Pavilion went silent, with the shrieks of Mosqueda-Lewis.  She was eventually able to get out and walk off of the floor, but she was favoring her right elbow.  The Huskies didn’t let what looked like a serious injury get to their heads, as they were able to get right back to the game.

The schedule won’t get any easier for the Huskies, as they travel to Maryland to take on the number eight ranked Terrapins.

For the Cardinal, they suffer their first loss since they were eliminated from the NCAA tournament in March and their first regular season loss since January 13, as the Cal Bears knocked them off at Maples 67-55.  The record moves to 1-1 on the season, as they return home to Maples this Friday where they host the Cal Poly Mustangs.