The Guru’s WBIT Report: Penn State Rallies Again Completing a Local Sweep After Saint Joseph’s and Villanova Had Made It to the Elite Eight

Note: Total updated WBIT scorecard in separate post below.

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

A day after the rest of round two was completed in the NCAA inaugural 32-team Women’s Basketball Tournament (WBIT), Penn State, one of the top four seeds, pulled another second-half rally, this time winning 74-66 over visiting  Belmont (26-9) of the Missouri Valley Conference Monday night at the Bryce Jordan Center in State College to advance to the Elite Eight.

“We wanted to start and play 40 minutes, obviously we didn’t do that to the best of our ability,” Penn State coach Carolyn Kieger said. “Just got to keep teaching and keep showing up and keep battling.”

All three locals in the field are still alive and two of them Thursday night at 7 p.m. will engage in a pseudo-Big 5 rematch when No. 3 Saint Joseph’s (28-5) takes a short trip up Montgomery Ave. and visits No. 1 Villanova (20-12) at the Wildcats’ Finneran Pavilion.

In December, the Hawks at home in Hagan Arena beat Villanova for the first time in a long while on the way to a 4-0 sweep of the City Series.

The four top seeds, who were the first group not taken into the NCAA tournament, were guaranteed home games in the first three rounds by advancing and three succeeded with Washington State on the Western side also moving forward while James Madison, now in the Sun Belt Conference, was upset opening night last Thursday.

Penn State will host No. 2 Mississippi State (23-11) in the Lady Lions’ quad at 6 p.m.

In the West, 4^th seed Illinois (16-15) of the Big Ten will be at 3^rd seed Tulsa (25-9) of the American Athletic Conference, Temple’s league, at 7:30 p.m.

The fourth game features No. 2 Toledo (28-5) of the Mid-American Conference at No. 1 Washington State (20-14) of the Pac-12 at 9 p.m.

All the games through this Thursday have been on ESPN+ while Monday afternoon’s national semifinals (2:30 p.m.)  will air on ESPNU and the title game at 7 p.m. Wednesday on ESPN2, both days from Butler’s Hinkle Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, the NCAA’s headquarters city.

Thursday winners advance to Indy, insuring one will be a Big 5 team, and if Penn State advances, that will be one of the doubleheader matches, insuring one will play in the championship.

Despite the new tourney, the traditional WNIT is continuing but with a reduced field of 48 teams from 64 in recent seasons.

However, though Columbia after being first out of the NCAA a year ago and advancing to the title game of the WNIT, the Ivy League ruled against participation this time, likely costing Harvard and Penn bids.

And Temple, with a late season surge, applied to the WBIT for consideration as a back-up, but did not apply to the WNIT, where the Owls surely would have been picked, perhaps cost factors the reason.

In the WBIT, this has been a redemption tour for all three local teams. 

Villanova suffered a bunch of narrow losses on the non-conference schedule after holding leads, took two tough hits at Providence and home against Butler in the Big East, besides letting St. John’s emerge victorious in the conference opener in Madison Square Garden and then fell in the Big East quarterfinals by two to Marquette after winning the two regular season games to be omitted.

Despite the loss of all-timer Maddy Siegrist to graduation and the WNBA, Villanova has had an ample replacement in Lucy Olsen stepping up to be among the nation’s top scorers behind Iowa’s Caitlyn Clark. 

Saint Joseph’s, powered by Talya Brugler and Lauta Ziegler with a strong supporting cast, set a record with the best start in program history besides now having the most wins but in the last week of the regular season the Hawks were upset at home by Fordham and then were upset in the Atlantic Ten quarterfinals by preseason favorite and sixth seed Rhode Island, costing a bid.

Penn State, which has now equaled its best win total since 2016-17, also the last time advancing that far in the postseason, was having its best run in years, especially early on the Big Ten slate, having almost upsetting eventual NCAA top seed Southern Cal of the Pac-12, beside taking eventual NCAA two-seed Ohio State into overtime in their first of two Big Ten meetings.

 But the Lady Lions went into a six-game tailspin after Virginia transfer point guard Tay Valladay suffered a season-ending injury at Minnesota on Jan. 31.

On Monday night two Lady Lions reached milestones – Leliani Kapinus scored her 1,000^th point and transfer guard Ashley Owusu grabbed her 500^th rebound.

Kapinus scored 11 in the contest. Makenna Marisa scored 18, 16 came in the second half, with three assists and two steals and Owusu had 16 with five boards. Jayla Oden scored 10.

“Scoring means a lot,” Kapinus said of her achievement. “I think of this moment since a little kid, so to be able to do it on a big stage like this is a dream come true.”

Though Marisa has carried the scoring load into her fifth season until Owusu stepped into active duty in January to help, until now she was already working on preseason workouts for November.

“It’s really cool and special,” she said. “Especially with this team - I love this team. I love playing with them.”

Belmont got 20 points from Kilyn McGuff, the daughter of Ohio State women’s coach Kevin McGuff.

On Thursday in the opener, Penn State trailed George Mason most of the night before rallying and forcing overtime to win 84-80.

On Monday, it was catch-up time again, the home team visitors were close in the first quarter and tied 14-14 when it ended.

In the second, Belmont stayed in front, but by no more than six points at times and took a 32-29 lead into the break.

Late in the third Marisa put PSU ahead 51-43 but Belmont had it down to six with one quarter left.

Penn State, however, stayed in front the rest of the way.

“We have to show and prove we can win in March, and this is an awesome opportunity for us to do that and learn and fail forward and keep propelling ourselves,” Kieger said. “And I think our team has done a really good job of that.”