Survive and Advance

Survive and Advance

Surviving and advancing is the motto of every team that has made it far in the NCAA tournament. Since last Monday, many teams have had to say their goodbyes, while many other teams have barely scraped by. In a tournament like this, it is normal to see close games and possible upsets, and that is what we saw during last week’s chaos. In the round of 32, two games went into overtime, including a double overtime thriller between No.5 seed Alabama and No.4 seed Maryland. That game had a combined score of 219 points, the most the women’s tournament has seen in over 30 years. Even though Alabama lost, shooting guard Sarah Baker set a new single-game scoring record with 45 points for the Crimson Tide. In the sweet sixteen, we had the battle to see who was the real UT. The University of Texas had a tough matchup against the University of Tennessee. Ranking-wise, this game should have been an easy one for Texas but everyone knew that ranking didn’t matter when you were dealing with the historic Lady Vols. The Lady Vols pushed the No.1 Texas Longhorns to their max with their amazing full-court press, but as the game got down to the wire, Texas was resilient and made shots when it mattered most. In the elite eight Uconns, Paige Bueckers set a new career high with her 40 points to help Uconn beat Oklahoma. Paige nearly scored half of Uconn’s 82 points. On the other side of the bracket, the No.1 overall seed, UCLA, defeated LSU in a rematch from last year’s tournament. In 2024, UCLA was knocked out of the elite eight by LSU, ruining their hopes of finally getting a Final Four appearance. This year, though, the vibe was completely different. UCLA was able to handle LSUs periodic scoring runs and countered their twos with threes down the stretch. Not only did UCLA get its revenge, but they will be going to their first-ever Final Four. Unlike other teams that were ranked No.1 this season, Notre Dame was unable to make it past the Sweet Sixteen. For the Irish, there has been zero luck, they have fallen short of the Final Four for the past several tournaments, a talented team with not much success. We could go on and on about all the madness this tournament has brought so far, but now the focus is on the best to come. Tonight will wrap up the elite eight, and the final four will be set. Friday, April 4th, we will see who is going to the championship game on Sunday, April 6th.

Season-Ending Injury for Juju Watkins 

On Monday night, in the round of 32 against Mississippi State, USC star Juju Watkins was injured on a fast-break layup attempt. Immediately after the contact, Juju went down and grabbed her knee, indicating that this was possibly a nightmare injury. The USC trainers attended to her as she struggled to get up. Eventually, she had to be carried off the court and back to the locker room for further evaluation. This injury happened just 13 minutes into the game, which meant USC had to go on without their star player. USC was able to do just that as transfer senior Kiki Iriafen stepped up by scoring 36 points to push USC to the Sweet Sixteen. After the social media blew up, many fans were concerned that the injury was a serious one. The next day, the sad news broke on the internet. USC announced the MRI scan confirmed everyone's worst nightmare: Juju had torn her ACL and would miss the rest of the tournament. This news was devastating for Juju, but she was met with immediate love and support from the whole basketball community. Women athletes are 6x more likely to tear their ACL, and much research is being done to try and lower those odds, but in the meantime, players like Juju Watkins will have to endure a year-long recovery. Juju is the most recent star player to have torn her ACL. Players like Olivia Miles, Paige Bueckers, and Azzi Fudd tore their ACLs during their college careers. Similarly, Paige and Azzi both tore their ACLs during their sophomore seasons. Juju Watkins was in good spirits as her team played against K-State in the Sweet Sixteen, her teammates even had a Juju Watkins Funko Pop on their sideline to show that she was still with them no matter what. Once again, USC was able to make it to the next round and will have a tough task as they will play UConn tonight to see who gets the last spot in the Final Four.

Scores from NWSL Weekend

Another NWSL weekend is in the books, with KC and Orlando still on top. Angel City got their first win over Seattle, and many other interesting scorelines are listed below from this past weekend:

• Orlando Pride 2-1 San Diego wave

• KC Current 3-0 Utah Royals

• Portland Thorns 0-0 NC Courage

• Houston 0-0 Gotham FC

• Washington Spirit 2-0 Bay FC

• Racing Louisville 1-0 Chicago Star FC

• Angel City 2-1 Seattle