The Guru’s National NCAAW Roundup: One-Point Victories and Several Upsets Highlight the Week So Far

 By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsgurux

Catching up on the week nationally, one game Friday, No. 23 over Penn, is in the local report below this report, and we go on to the rest.

No upsets but one close call on Monday as No. 3 South Carolina won its Southeastern Conference (SEC) game at Texas A&M, 71-56 while in the same conference No. 3 Ole Miss won at home 71-45 over Auburn.

The close call was in the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) No. 25 North Carolina, which got back into the Associated Press women’s poll hours earlier, edged N.C. State in Raleigh 61-59.

On Tuesday no ranked teams played while on Wednesday No. 22 Maryland stopped its slide in the Big Ten winning 86-70, No. 8 Michigan at home won its Big Ten game 88-76, the Big Ten rout by No. 2 UCLA over Rutgers is reported in the local post.

No. 1 UConn continued its unbeaten run as the defending NCAA champs won their Big East Conference game 86-40 at DePaul in Chicago and in the Big 12, No. 15 Baylor on the road fended off Cincinnati for a narrow 76-70 victory, No. 14 TCU won 90-45 at home in Fort Worth over Houston, and No. 20 West Virginia won at Colorado 61-55.

In the Connecticut game, Azzi Fudd had 25 points, giving the Huskies their 40th straight win since a late season lost last year at Tennessee. Sarah Strong added 14 points with six rebounds and five assists.

The Huskies have won 19 straight by 25 or more points, the longest Division I streak in the last 25 seasons.

Thursday, however, was electric with one-point wins, and a few upsets.

In the SEC, No. 4 Texas (22-2, 7-2) got its revenge on No. 5 LSU 77-64 on the Tigers (21-3, 7-3) at home in Austin as Madison Booker had 18 points for the winning Longhorns, Aaliyah Crump scored 16, and Rori Harmon had six steals to set the program record with 351, passing the 346 achieved by Linda Waggoner from 1976-80, and adding to her ongoing program record with career assists.

LSU’s Mikaylah Williams led the Tigers with 20 points.

No. 21 Alabama (20-4, 6-4) at home in Tuscaloosa, upset No. 13 Ole Miss 64-63 as Jessica Timmons scored 23 points and grabbed seven boards while Diana Collins scored the winner on a driving layup with 18 seconds left in regulation.

Cotie McMahon led the Rebels (19-5, 6-3) with 22 points but a go-ahead score with 10 seconds left was ruled out of play when she was called for a charge.

Alabama coach Kristy Curry gained her 550th career triumph with the victory.

No. 7 Vanderbilt (22-2, 8-2) won 85-84 at No. 16 Kentucky (18-6, 5-5) in Lexington as Mikayla Blakes scored 37 points, 19 in the final period for the Commodores.

Aubrey Galvin had four foul shots in the final 19 seconds to preserve the win.

The Wildcats had a potential win get away when Amelia Hasset’s 3-point attempt went off the rim and Teonni Key, who had 27 points and 12 boards, made a putback that did not beat the buzzer.

Clara Strack had 14 points and 12 rebounds for the home team while Hassett scored 19.

No. 19 Tennessee, coming off its non-conference blowout loss to No. 1 Connecticut on Sunday, beat host Georgia 82-77 in overtime in Athens as Zee Spearman scored 23 points for the Lady Vols (15-5, 7-1) while Talaysia Cooper had 16 points and Janiah Parker had nine points and 13 rebounds.

The game went into overtime when Dani Carnegie sank all three foul shots for Georgia (18-5, 4-5) with five seconds left in regulation.

Carnegie finished with 25 points.

No. 3 South Carolina (23-2, 9-1) had an easy time winning 88-45 at home in Columbia over Mississippi State (16-8, 3-7) as Joyce Edwards scored 21 points, including her 1,000th point, the third sophomore for the Gamecocks to reach the milestone in that class level behind Sheila Foster and A’ja Wilson.

In the Atlantic Coast Conference, No. 17 Duke nipped No. 6 Louisville on the road in the Atlantic Coast Conference 59-58 as Toby Fournier scored 15 and had a key block for the Blue Devils (17-6, 12-0) who had 19 turnovers.

However, the Cardinals (21-4, 11-1) shot 33.9% from the field, their worst this season, and missed a tie when Imari Berry missed her second of two foul shots with 1.1 seconds left in regulation.

No. 25 North Carolina (19-5, 8-3) won at home in Chapel Hill 53-44 over Clemson (16-8, 7-5) as Nyla Harris had 17 points with 10 rebounds and a pair of steals.

Clemson’s Rusne Augustinaite had 15 points.

In other ACC results among unranked teams, Stanford won 86-65 at Pitt, Syracuse won 93-59 at Boston College, Notre Dame topped visiting Virginia Tech 80-70 and NC State beat visiting Florida State 83-55.

In the Big Ten, Minnesota upset host No. 10 Iowa 91-85 as the Golden Gophers (17-6, 8-4) as Grace Grocholski scored 21 points and Mara Braun added 16 points for their fifth straight win, longest for the program in the conference since 2018-19.

Iowa (18-5, 9-3) has dropped three straight since losing Taylor McCabe to a season-ending knee injury. She had been the Hawkeyes’ best 3-point shooter.

Minnesota last beat a Top 10 team on the road in 2005.

Ava Heiden scored 24 points for Iowa.

No. 9 Ohio State (21-3, 10-2) won 70-60 over host and No. 24 Washington (17-6, 7-5) as Buckeyes coach Kevin McGuff, who also coached at Xavier and Washington, reached his 500th career victory.

Jaloni Cambridge scored 26 points for Ohio State, reached 25 points for her fourth straight game while the Huskies of the Northwest were led by Sayvia Sellers with 26 points, 11 in the fourth period.

USC on the rebound won 83-65 at Northwestern in Evanston, Ill., as veteran Wildcats coach Joe McKeown, who had announced his impending retirement prior to the season, is reaching closer to his last game.

In other games of note beyond ranked teams and not already reported in the local report posted below this one, Maine won at Vermont 55-46 in the America East on Thursday, FDU, the defending Northeast Conference champion, won 80-49 at Stonehill, Belmont won 67-52 at Drake in the Missouri Valley Conference, and Gonzaga won at home 67-37 over Oregon State in the West Coast Conference.

Looking Ahead

On Saturday, No. 1 UConn hosts Butler in the Big East at 1 p.m. (FS1), No. 22 Maryland is at Nebraska in Lincoln in the Big Ten at 2 p.m. (BTN), and in the Big 12, No. 15 Baylor hosts Arizona State at 6 p.m. (FS1) in Waco, Texas, while No. 20 West Virginia hosts Arizona at 2 p.m. in Morgantown and No. 18 Texas Tech is at Houston at 6 p.m., both on ESPN+.

On Sunday in the SEC, Tennessee is at South Carolina at 3 p.m. on ABC and in the Big Ten, No. 2 UCLA is at No. 8 Michigan in Ann Arbor at 3 p.m. on FOX.

On Monday, in the SEC, No. 18 Kentucky is at No. 4 Texas at 7:30 p.m. on the SEC Network in Austin while No. 11 Oklahoma is at No. 7 Vanderbilt in Nashville at 9 p.m. on ESPN2.