The Guru’s NCAAW Final Four Preview Roundup: South Carolina, Texas, UCLA and UConn Comprise The Most Solid Semifinals Lineup in 43 Year History

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

TAMPA, FLA. — Asked Thursday afternoon here in the Amalie Arena, home of the local NHL Lightning, at the preview press conference to assess the NCAA Women’s Final Four — UCLA (34-2), Connecticut (35-3), South Carolina (34-3), and Texas (35-3)— Longhorns coach Vic Schaefer, who twice previously took Mississippi State to this stage, responded, “I think they said three of the four teams have been ranked No. 1 (all but Connecticut) this season.

“It’s an incredible group. When you think about every team, no team has that many losses. I think everybody’s a conference champion, he referenced the Big East, SEC, and Big Ten.

“It’s really, again, whoever gets through this semifinal and final will have done it against the best of the best. So, I think for all of us, we all understand it. It’s hard to do,” Schaefer continued.

“And so, you really get this far, and it doesn’t matter, I tell my kids all the time. When they leave to go to bed, I’m like, look, I’ll sleep when I’m dead. Right now, this is the most important thing in my life. And for them, I want them to have every opportunity to be successful. It is a gauntlet, for sure. So, we’ll kind of see how it shakes out this weekend.”

Three of the seeds were No.  1 over their regions, the exception No. 2 UConn., which is virtually a defacto No. 1 with a ranking of third in the current Associated Press women’s poll and making a record 24th appearance, including 18 of the last 19 years.

Disney, which made the women’s tournament part of a new record multimillion-dollar broadcast deal, will be covering all three games, Friday night’s semifinals doubleheader at 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. on ESPN, and Sunday afternoon’s championship at 3 p.m. on ABC, plus additional coverage on the rest of its platforms.

Ratings may not exceed the boffo numbers of last year with former Iowa star Caitlin Clark in her final collegiate appearance before becoming the overall No.  1 pick in the WNBA draft and eventual rookie of the year with the Indiana Fever.

But a myriad of storylines exist that are capable of minimally driving eyeballs second best ahead of anything else in the 43-year history of the tournament. During the season, record numbers were achieved in broadcasts over FOX, CBS Sports, and (NBC) Peacock.

There’s no Philadelphia team here but the field includes two Philadelphia legendary coaches, one a former local superstar, with UConn’s Geno Auriemma and South Carolina’s Dawn Staley, though their (roots) hometown newspaper, dealing with economic problems, is one of the few of the so-called national publications not represented, according to multiple sources, the reason referenced that decision makers believe the No. 1 women’s collegiate sports event in the nation has little value to its readers.

That’s likely to translate as a negative strike one with the WNBA wonks who have received a 76ers/Comcast-backed bid from among a bunch of cities chasing the fourth and last expansion offering in the current cycle.

Friday, Game 1 at 7 p.m. has South Carolina, seeking to be back-to-back champions, which would be Staley’s fourth, against Texas, meeting for fourth time this season with the Longhorns having realigned from the Big 12 to the Southeastern Conference.

The two teams split their regular season meeting to become co-champions, the Gamecocks winning big at home in Columbia, followed by the ‘Horns winning narrowly in Austin, and then South Carolina easily adding another conference crown in the league tourney.

Texas under former Hall of Famer Jody Conradt last made it this far in 2003, a game remembered for the Longhorns on the verge of winning over UConn until the fabled Diana Taurasi took over for a rally in the closing minutes sending the Huskies to the final round against Tennessee and on to another of their NCAA record 11 championships.

Auriemma has since gone to also hold the all-time collegiate coaching win record for men or women currently at 1,248 and extending with every additional victory each time he returns to the sidelines.

Texas is paced by Rori Harmon, who missed most of last season with a knee injury, and Madison Booker, who moved over to Harmon’s guard spot after the mishap and thrived in the backcourt.

UConn, due to a slew of injuries and back to back buzzer-beating Final Four losses (2017, 2018), hasn’t won its most recent title since 2016 and this is the last go-round for graduate star Paige Bueckers, who missed a full season after one half, with injuries but has been on a recent tear and on Thursday was named the Women’s Basketball Coaches Association’s Wade Winner.

She is expected to be this year’s No.  1 overall draft pick in the WNBA with the Dallas Wings, thus becoming a teammate of former Villanova superstar Maddy Siegriest, who went third overall in 2023.

In the second game, the Huskies will meet UCLA, whose Cori Close was named both the AP’s and WBCA’s coach of the year Thursday, while the AP player honor went to Southern Cal’s JuJu Watkins, who accepted by video remote back home in Los Angeles, where she is having surgery for the tournament-ending ACL right knee injury she suffered at home  in Round Two of the Tournament.

The WBCA Mel Greenberg Media Award went to ESPN studio co-host and game analyst Carolyn Peck.

UCLA, which won the 1978 national title led by Ann Meyers Drysdale, a four-time all-American, when women’s championships were under the AIAW tournament, is in its first NCAA Final Four featuring Lauren Betts.

Many members of that squad were planning to attend this weekend.

The Bruins, who joined with Southern Cal and two other former PAC-12 teams into the Big Ten last summer, earned their first No. 1 AP ranking early in the season, stayed on top for 12 weeks, then returned after avenging two losses to the cross-town Trojans to win the conference title.

“This is where we saw ourselves back in August,” Close said.

Two former UConn stars — the retired WNBA duo of Sue Bird and Maya Moore — along with WNBA star Sylvia Fowles out of LSU — are expected, multiple sources say, to be named as part of the 2025 Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame Class to be announced this weekend.

Besides Bueckers, the Huskies are paced by freshman Sarah Strong, who Thursday was named WBCA freshman of the year; Azzi Fudd, and Princeton transfer Kaitlyn Chen, who played for former Huskies standout Carla Berube, who was on UConn’s first national champion in 1995.

Ivy transfers leaving for another year are less contentious in that the league presidents do not allow the extra eligibility of recent times permitted elsewhere.

Chen was asked if Berube gave her the Book of UConn, though Auriemma is now several decades older, in deciding where else to attend.

“She was definitely a very helpful resource as someone who played here and knows the coaches very well,” Chen smiled. “She’s someone who I trust tremendously and someone who helped me make this decision, for sure.”

South Carolina was more like a committee this season, Te-Hina Pao, Pao, and Chloe Chitts, a few of the multiples to help keep the Gamecocks in the penthouse neighorhood mosst of the way.

 After going unbeaten in 2024 and early this season, the Gamecocks were thumped on a visit to UCLA, lifting the Bruins to No. 1, lost the second Texas game and were routed at home by UConn, a surprising result that lifted the Huskies to their formative days of appreciation, especially after Watkins injury made playing Southern Cal a bit less challenging in the Elite Eight to get here.

Preview days allows for a wide range of topics besides the focus on the actual games, with attention paid to the flood of players entering the transfer portal, Name, Likeness, Image (NIL) deals and the likely soon-to-be revenue sharing, the lions share going to football and men’s and women’s basketball.

This is also the first year the women’s side is earning financial units as the men have done for years.

On revenue sharing, Auriemma predicted, “It will ruin parity. That’s number one. I’m for revenue sharing. There will be less parity in the game of basketball.

“If you look at it right now there’s less parity happening every year in men’s basketball. People talk about the same schools in the Final Four every year. And as the money now drives it, there’s going to be less people that have that kind of money. There’s going to be less of them that are to want to give it to women’s basketball.

“So, if the number of teams that could win the national title championship, when it was us and Tennessee and everybody else wanted anybody to win other than UConn and Tennessee. And then it kind of stretched, kind of stretched, kind of stretched.

“Now, you look at the landscape today and it’s still a lot of the same teams, but there’s a lot more vying for that spot in the Final Four,” Auriemma said.

“Now that’s all going to go away. … It’s going to be who is going to become the (baseball) Dodgers and Yankees. And how many of those are you going to have and how many other programs in women’s basketball are going to be Milwaukee and Kansas City. Because that’s where we’re headed.”

“And we play UCLA. They’re really good. Just thought I’d throw that in.”

Rebounds

Villanova has been hit by another star Maddie Webber heading to the transfer portal a year after Lucy Olsen left for Iowa and Christina Dalce for Maryland.

Former Division III coach Jackie Hartzell at USciences and currently Arcadia has been hired to fill the vacancy at D1 Rider, while Penn associate head coach Kelly Killion has been named head coach at American U.

UCLA’s Lauren Betts was named WBCA Defensive Player of the Year while Iowa coach Jan Jensen won the Maggie Dixon honor that goes to a first-year head coach.

The ten-member WBCA All-American team consists of Bueckers, Kentucky’s Georgia Amoore, Betts, Booker, Notre Dame’s Hannah Hidalgo of Merchantville, Southern Cal’s Kki Iriafen, a transfer from Stanford this season, LSU’s Aneesah Morrow, Strong, TCU’s Hailey Van Lift and Watkins.

Photograher William “Willbill” Ewart is on the scene and here are links to a gallery of shots from the AP Coach of the Year, WBCA Wade Trophy, WBCA Coach of the Year, and WBCA Mel Greenberg Media Awards.

https://williamewartphoto.photoshelter.com/gallery/AP-Coach-of-the-Year/G0000Tb0aOExeVlo/

 

https://williamewartphoto.photoshelter.com/gallery/2025-WBCA-Wade-Trophy/G0000miYSQ3LhbI0/

 

https://williamewartphoto.photoshelter.com/gallery/2025-WBCA-Coach-of-the-Year-Award/G0000lqq.tT1WLGE/

 

https://williamewartphoto.photoshelter.com/gallery/2025-WBCA-Mel-Greenberg-Award/G0000ZTTnntJIPG4/

 

 

 

 

  

The Guru’s NCAAW Tourney Report: UConn and Texas Join South Carolina and UCLA for This Weekend’s Final Four: Villanova Felled by Belmont in WBIT

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

And now there are four and what a four they are.

 

A day after two No. 1 seeds hit the first two spots for this weekend’s NCAA Women’s Final Four at Amelia Arena in Tampa, Fla., with top-ranked UCLA (34-2) and defending champion South Carolina hitting their marks, the Bruins making their first-ever appearance in the 43-year history of the tournament, No.1 seed and fifth-ranked Texas (35-3)  in the Birmingham (Ala.) Region 3 sector Monday night beat No. 2 TCU 58-47.

 

Then came the extra thriller of the weekend in the Spokane (Wash.) Region 4, with national player of the year JuJu Watkins lost for the rest of the tournament a week ago with an ACL right knee injury to No. 1 and fourth-ranked Southern Cal (31-4), the rematch of last season in the same round saw Paige Bueckers with an encore performance in the sunset of her collegiate career score 31 points with six assists to once again lead No. 2 seeded and third-ranked UConn (35-3) to a 78-64 victory and 18th appearance in the last 19 years in the national semifinals. Overall, the squad has advanced to a record 24 Final Fours.

 

It’s the third straight performance of 30 plus points for Bueckers, likely to be the No.  1 pick in next month’s WNBA draft going to the Dallas Wings after scoring 34 in Round 2 at home in Gampel Pavilion, her farewell appearance from her campus home.

 

She followed up on Saturday night, her career record lasted just five days before she exploded for 40 in the win over Oklahoma and on Monday, Bueckers came back with 31 shooting 9-18 from the field and 4-8 from deep to topple the Trojans as Hall of Fame Huskies coach Geno Auriemma’s collegiate record win total for men or women extended to 2,148.

 

But the final score not an indicator of the true nature of the game because though two Texas teams faced each other in the early game across the country, trailing by 19 USC rallied in the third period to slice the differential down to five early in the fourth quarter until the Huskies applied the breaks and took control and pulled away.

 

Watkins may have been gone but coach Lindsay Gottlieb got 23 points and 15 boards from senior Rayah Marshall, while two transfers from former Pac-12 rivals prior to the move to the Big Ten, senior Kiki Iriafen from Stanford, and Talia von Oelhoffen each scored 10.

 

“I think there was never a point where this team gave up, so making that run was huge,” von Oelhoffen said.  “And coming out of halftime, we knew we weren’t out of it, and we just needed to have a good third quarter, but it just felt like we couldn’t get stops when we needed to at critical moments during runs.

 

“So, credit to UConn and the adjustments they made and hitting big shots but just proud of how we fought regardless of the halftime score.”

Added Marshall, “… We all went down fighting as a Trojan and that’s the culture, continue to fight on.”

 

The loss prevented USC from ending a long drought having last made it to the semifinals and on to the championship game in Cheryl Miller’s senior season in 1986 losing to Texas, which claimed the first NCAA unbeaten record at 34-0.

 

Miller led the Trojans to back-to-back titles in 1983-84.

 

However, on Monday night the UConn story wasn’t just Bueckers showing the future is bright as freshman Sarah Strong scored 22 with 17 points while down the stretch Princeton transfer Kaitlyn Chen bolstered the recovery and finished with 15 points, having shot 6-9 and Azzi Fudd, who is foregoing the WNBA draft to return next season, had eight, though her shooting was a mediocre 9-14, but shaking off an 0-9 start to score eight points in the final period.

 

For all the great players in UConn history with a record 11 NCAA titles, Strong is the first freshman to produce a 20-point,10-rebound game at the Elite Eight level or further in the tournament.

 

Bueckers, according to ESPN Research, is the first player since 2001 to reach 30 points on 50 percent shooting in three straight games, the last being Jackie Stiles at then-named Southwest Missouri State.

 

“There’s a way that you win these games,” Auriemma said, and, generally speaking, they are on the backs of one or two particular players to pugt the team on their backs and get us to the next level to get us to the next level, to get us to the Final Four, and obviously Sarah and Paige both did that tonight in their own way, and you couldn’t ask any more of them. They both played 40 minutes and they both played their hearts out.

 

“But, like anything else, somebody else has to step up, and I thought Kaitlyn was fantastic tonight. Probably more than anything, I’m really proud of her because she left (Princeton). Took a chance, I want to goto a Final Four, I want to try to play for a National Championship, and I’m glad that we were able to provide that opportunity for her.”

 

Ironically, Chen, whose Ivy eligibility was expired, played for Carla Berube, who in UConn’s first championship game in 1995 against Tennessee provided a similar performance for the Huskies to win their first title.

 

“It’s been an incredible so far,” Chen said. “Honestly, I never thought I would make it to a Final Four, but here I am. But that’s all — all the credit goes to my coaches and my teammates because we wouldn’t be here without them.”    

 

The Huskies got off to a dominating start going ahead by 14 points at the half, the deepest deficit for USC since the start of last season. But the Trojans refused to concede.

 

“I give a lot of credit to USC for what they were able to do, given what they had to endure, you know, with JuJu,” Auriemma said. “It’s not easy, I’ve been there, and I thought some of their kids stepped up and were terrific.

 

“Unfortunately, some of that stuff catches up to you, because at this point in the year somebody like JuJu would have been needed to carry them over the hump. Like, we got Paige. So, I have a lot of respect for their coaching staff and their team, and they could have easily just rolled over when we got up 19, and instead they fought back, and I think they cout it to six. That says a lot about them. And then we had to show some grit.”

From the other side, Gottlieb said, “I want to start out first by congratulating a UConn team that is really good, obviously could win a national championship. But to me is the way they do it. You know, nothing but respect.

 

“And then what I said to our team in there was from the second we lost at this round last year, I said the bar’s been raised, the standard’s been raised, and even though we’ve lost at the same point and stage, I think our team a hundred percent delivered on raising that bar and raising that standard, and  I  thought it took a lot for us internally to get to that point where we were legitimately a national championship contender, a real Top 5 team all year long.

 

“We lost a tough game to Notre Dame and we looked inwardly, and I just couldn’t be more proud of this group. We lost a National Player of the Year one week ago today and we’ve won two NCAA tournament games, second and 16 rounds, because they really became a team. And I was really proud of the way we competed tonight,” she continued.

 

“I think you saw the heart and character of our team on display, and I’m disappointed for them that we don’t get to go to Tampa and get two more games, but I’m not I’m not sad with the way this group represented themselves and I think our senior class is really, really special.”

 

Of Watkins moving forward, Gottlieb told ESPN, “We don’t know what JuJu will do. Will she take the whole year and redshirt? Will she try to come back at some point.

 

“Those aren’t conversations for right now, but I do think we will dive into how do we stay an elite team regardless of those circumstances.

 

“We will have time to figure out how to be great, even if JuJu isn’t out there.”

 

In the wake of Connecticut’s lopsided surprising win at South Carolina in early February, and Bueckers off her performances in the last week returning to her celebrated time becoming national player of the year, ESPN is making the Huskies the odds-on favorite to end their nine-year title drought.

 

Following Monday night’s win ESPN BET odds is calling Auriemma’s team the -150 favorite, followed by South Carolina at +210, Texas at +650 and UCLA at +750.

 

Meanwhile, Texas ended a magical season of TCU (34-4), which under Mark Campbell turned around the last two seasons to win the Big 12 and earn a No.  2 seed, along with a sixth-place ranking in the AP women’s poll, and first-ever appearance in the Elite Eight.

 

The winning Longhorns, who tied defending champion South Carolina for the regular season SEC crown, have returned to their former glory days under Vic Schaefer, who took Mississippi State to two Final Fours in 2017 and 2018 and then two seasons later returned to his home state to revive the Texans women’s fortunes.

 

One of those Schaefer trips was in one of several previous times the event has been in Tampa.

 

It’s Texas’ first Final Four appearance since 2003, a painful memory for veteran Longhorns fans recalling in the semifinals the squad had UConn on the ropes before the Huskies rallied in the last few minutes to win 71-69 and move on to beat Tennessee 73-68 for the national title.

 

On Monday, Rori Harmon, sidelined with a knee injury most of last season in which Texas was ejected in an Elite Eight game, scored 13, while Madison Booker, who changed positions to fill her backcourt role after that injury and rose to prominence, scored 18.

 

“Just to see us get to the Final Four after recovering and coming back from my ACL injury in 10 months,” Harmon said. “I thought it was and amazing thing, and I was just really proud of myself in that moment.”

 

Hailey Van Lith, who set a record being the first men’s or women’s player appearing in five straight Elite Eight games with three different teams, scored 17 points.

 

The Horned Frogs, who committed 21 turnovers, yielding nine steals, and were blocked six times, were still in contention early in the fourth period.

 

TCU made one more thrust after falling behind by double digits, but Booker and Harmon ran off two jumpers to get the Longhorns into safe territory and there they stayed the rest of the way.

 

On Friday, Texas gets another SEC encore in its new conference conference after leaving the Big 12 play South Carolina for the fourth time. The Gamecocks won big at home in their first meeting and then the Longhorns evened it up with a narrow win in Austin.

 

Dawn Staley’s crew then won big again in the conference championship.

 

Had Southern Cal won, the Trojans and UCLA, who moved from the PAC-12 to the Big Ten this season, would have also faced each other a fourth time.

 

With Watkins still active in regular season play, USC in Los Angeles hit the cross-town rival Bruins twice for both their season losses, the first time ending a 12-week UCLA run at the top of the AP poll, the first time they ever got that high, and the second snapping a tie  on the last day of the regular season.

 

A week later coach Clori Closes’ team got revenge in the Big Ten tourney title game and returned to No. 1 in the final pre-NCAA tourney poll.

 

There will be one more ranking after Sunday’s championship, the second time the AP has come back for one more begun a year ago for the first time in what is now the 48th year since the rankings were launched in 1976.

Three No. 1 seeds advanced though UConn could be considered a defacto No. 1, considering the effect of Watkins’ departure.

 

Villanova Falls in WBIT Semifinals to Belmont

 

The Wildcats’ run in the second annual tourney launched last season by the NCAA ended Monday afternoon one game short of a year ago when they got past Penn State and fell to Illinois in the championship held at their Big East rivals-Butler’s Hinkle Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, where the event returned this year.

 

This time Belmont (25-12) created the season’s final chapter winning 66-57, dominating the Wildcats (21-15) in the second half.

 

Maddie Webber continued her fine play in the postseason for Denise Dillon’s Main Liners scoring 18 points with five boards and four assists while Canadian freshman Jasmine Bascoe scored 10 with five boards and five assists, Denae Carter had six points and eight boards, and Maddie Burke in her final game grabbed seven rebounds.

 

Belmont’s Jailyn Banks scored 25 points and Kendall Holmes scored 14.

 

“It was a heck of a battle, they are a great team, and they showed it today,” Dillon said. “As I just talked to our team, I couldn’t be prouder of our Wildcats and being here and just continue to stretch the season out and being able to play another game with them.

 

“So proud of each and every one of them, and a special one it was for sure.”

 

Webber said of the second half difficulties, “I just think the whole game. They were consistent with their intensity. I think we were up and down at times, which obviously doesn’t help. I would just say that was the biggest thing in the game.”

 

Belmont coach Bart Brooks, who used to deal with the Wildcats as an assistant at DePaul in Big East competition said, “I have so much respect for them, and to beat them on a quick turnaround, I think it speaks volumes to the toughness of our group.”

 

In the second game, Minnesota (24-11) beat Florida 66-52 and will play Belmont Wednesday at 6 p.m. on ESPN2 for the championship.

 

The Golden Gophers of the Big Ten, whose 12 teams above them all went to the NCAA tournament, got 20 points from Grace Grocholski with six boards, Mallory Heyer scored 13 with 15 rebounds, and Amaya Battle scored 10.

 

The Gators (19-18) of the SEC got 18 points from Liv McGill, while Laila Reynolds scored 11.  

 

Portal Stunner: Oliva Miles Foregoes WNBA Draft but Leaves Notre Dame

The remainder of the Elite Eight filling the last spots of the Final Four wasn’t the day’s only major news as the transfer portal continued to fill while coaching departure continued to attract attention.

 

Notre Dame backcourt star Oliva Miles, who with Merchantville’s Hannah Hidalgo helped make the Fighting Irish a top 10 team most of the season, had been forecasted as a No. 2 WNBA pick at the lottery level in next month’s draft behind Connecticut’s Bueckers, expected to go to the Dallas Wings.

 

But ESPN reported Miles had decided to forego the draft, still having another year of collegiate eligibility, but instead of returning to Notre Dame, was entering the portal.

 

At age 22, Miles is eligible to jump into the draft, but she holds a year of eligibility having sat out last season after injuring her knee near the end of 2022-23.

 

This season she was in the starting lineup for all 34 games and averaged 15.4 points.

 

Georgia Tech’s Fortner Retires

 

Yellowjackets coach Nell Fortner, who starred on Texas in the mid-1980s and coached the Olympic team to a Gold Medal in 2000 at the Summer Games in Australia, announced her retirement from Georgia Tech of the ACC, which was ranked during the season.

 

She also coached the WNBA Indiana Fever, long before the squad and had three different teams ranked 55 times in the AP Women’s Poll.

 

And that’s Your Report