The Guru’s March Madness Report Day Nine: Drexel Advances to CAA Semifinals Against Upset Winner Hofstra While No. 23 Princeton Meets Narrow Winner Harvard for Ivy Crown; Vermont Repeats as America East Champs

 By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsgurux

No. 23 Princeton (25-3) and Drexel took care of business in their first steps in their respective conference tournaments Friday and even had some help in the big picture scenario making three area teams still alive to join presumed Villanova to hear their names called Sunday night at 8 p.m. on ESPN when the NCAA 68-team field is announced.

After waiting for the single-game round one to be completed Wednesday and a day of four round two affairs on Thursday, and three games ahead of getting back in action in quarterfinal play Friday night in the Coastal Athletic Association event at the WNBA Washington Mystics’ CareFirst Arena, three-seed Drexel (21-9) held its own heading into the final period with a five-point lead and then erupted on a 14-2 run to dominate No. 6 Elon 68-53 and head to Saturday’s semifinals for the ninth time in the past decade playing in the 4:30 p.m. second contest.

As for the help, instead of meeting No. 2 Campbell, who beat the Dragons in their lone meeting early in the conference portion of the season, Drexel will face 10th seed Hofstra (10-21), which became the lowest seed in the history of the tourney to reach the semifinals through upsetting the Camels 55-50.

A word of caution, though, low seeds have had success in recent seasons becoming bracket busters, including Drexel, which two years ago took the title as a No. 7 seed.

There almost was even more help, No. 1 seed Charleston (25-5) barely dodged an upset strike from eighth seed and defending tourney champion William & Mary, 58-55, winning the game against the Tribe (17-14) on the strength of Sophia Tougas’ career day beyond the ark with six makes for all 18 of her points while Taryn Barbot, the conference player of the year, with 17 points, four boards, and five assists.

An upset of the Cougars seemed ready to happen when William & Mary’s Natalie Fox scored to bring the Tribe within three with 1:31 left in regulation.

But that was to be William & Mary’s final points the contest.

In the 2 p.m. semifinal game, Charleston will face fourth-seed Stony Brook (18-14) which defended fifth-seed Monmouth 51-45, ending the Hawks’ season at 20-11, though its possible a bid could come from the WNIT.

In Hofstra’s win, Alarice Gooden scored 14 points, Emma Von Essen scored 11 points, and Chloe Sterling scored 10.

In Drexel’s win, All-CAA guard Amaris Baker led the way with 16 points while freshman Bria Watkins scored 13 points, grabbed six boards and swiped four steals.

The Dragons forced the Phoenix into 22 turnovers leading to 30 points.

“I can’t be more pleased with this group today,” said Drexel coach Amy Mallon. “This first game when you come out, there’s just so much tension, and I was just happy with the bench, the way they came in.

“And that’s what you need this time of the season and our two freshman and Molly Rullo scoring when we needed them to.”

I couldn’t have done it without my team, the way they came through with their passes, their stops, their steals,” Watkins said. “They motivate me to keep going.”

“The big thing,” Mallon said of how the game evolved, “we talked about what we need to do on the defensive end, obviously we were struggling a little bit. We came out, we started moving the ball. We were taking quick shots. We were waiting to see the open player,” she continued.

“I think our patience at times became part of our defense and we did a great job moving the ball and everyone getting good looks.

“That’s how we play and when we’re doing that good things happen for our team.”

Princeton Routs Brown; Harvard Edges Columbia for an Overtime Upset

Bubble teams elsewhere were buoyed with No. 1 seed Princeton in the Ivy Madness semifinals at Cornell’s Newman Arena in Ithaca, N.Y., easily jumping to a 21-3 first-quarter lead and handling No. 4 Brown 65-51, since the belief is a Tigers title win avoids a bid steal and two-team entry following the three advancing last year.

That was caused when when three-seed Harvard beat Columbia for the championship, and in game two Friday night the Crimson dealt the Lions more heartache with a 67-65 win in overtime presenting Princeton in Saturday’s championship with the lesser of two evils, having been swept by Columbia during the season.

Madison St. Rose led the nationally ranked Tigers with18 points against the Bears (16-11), while Ashley Chea scored 12, and Fadima Tall and Skye Belker each scored 11 points. Olivia Hutcherson had eight points and nine rebounds.

“You know, it’s about survive and advance this time of year, and like I said, really, really proud of my group for, yeah, getting this victory and playing in the championship tomorrow,” said Princeton coach Carla Berube.

Off the way the Tigers exploded from the outset, St. Rose, said the team needed to avoid a bad start and Brown making it a tough game.

“We really made sure that in this game we had a good start, and I feel like we were really sharing the ball,” she said. “We were executing what we needed to execute, and we were playing Princeton basketball, and like everything was just running really smoothly.”

At one point during the Tigers press conference, Berube quipped of the next game that would yield their title game opponent, “We hope it goes into triple overtime. That’d be nice.”

That didn’t happen, but the sense of her wish did in a battle all the way between Harvard (18-10) and Columbia (20-8).

The winning Crimson were led by Abigail Wright with 18 points, Karlee White added 16 points, and Saniyah Glenn scored 12.

The Columbia loss wasted an heroic effort by Riley Weiss, the Ivy player of the year, who carried the Lions on her shoulders scoring 25 points, shooting 9-for-18 from the field and 4-8 from deep while Mia Broom scored 12 and Susie Raifu scored 10 points.

Down eight late in regulation, Columbia closed to force the extra period which ended when with Weiss taking a shot, the official blowing the whistle calling a foul on Harvard but then going to the monitor revealed the call was made after time expired.

“I mean, we knew it was going to be a heavyweight match, all right, between these two teams,” said Harvard coach Carrie Moore. “Every time we play them, it is like this and this time of the year, you know, I wouldn’t expect anything less.

“A little déjà vu moment, because, you know, championship game here last year, you know, they also had a shot to tie it. I feel like we’ve really prepped all year long to learn how to finish basketball games. We weren’t great all year long, but we are finishing basketball games at the right time and just couldn’t be more proud to be their coach.”

“You just have to have a consistency in how you do things,” said Columbia coach Megan Griffith, who is a native of King of Prussia. That’s been our problem all year. We just have a lack of maturity that allows us to be as consistent as possible and show up throughout the game and not just in crunch time of a game.

“Not being able to execute on that last play was really hard. Just another player making another mistake. It’s a play you’ve run a million times in practice and the only thing I can do is … I haven’t taught them well enough. You just have to eat that, because as their coach, for us to move on, I’ll carry the burden so we can be better the rest of March.”

Columbia is hopeful of a WBIT bid, the Ivies don’t allow teams to go to the WNIT, which the Lions went to the title game several years ago before the NCAA introduced the former tournament.

The 24-team field will be revealed on ESPN+ at 9 p.m.

The other local still in play is Lehigh in the Patriot League, the fourth seed, which Sunday afternoon at noon will attempt to repeat the title playing at Holy Cross.

The National Scene: Vermont Repeats as America East Champs

The Catamounts at home in Burlington as the No. 1 seed became the 19th team over the back end of the current two weeks to claim one of the 31 automatic qualifiers easily beating No. 2 seed Maine 61-43, initially falling behind 9-2 and then reversing direction with a 12-2 run to end the first period.

Nikola Priede repeated her Most Outstanding Player honor averaging 17.3 points, 6.0 rebounds, and 3.3 blocks in Vermont’s three games, all at home as the top seed.

Against Maine, she had 14 points, eight boards, and a pair of blocks.

In other action Friday, another No. 1 seed was taken down, the 11th so far, though a few from Power 4 leagues have no worries.

In the Big West, Hawaii in overtime upset UC Irvine, the regular season champ, and will play Saturday for the title at 6 p.m. on ESPN+ against UC San Diego, one of eight championship games day, including the Ivy League.

In the other six, Toledo will play Miami of Ohio in the Mid-American in Cleveland at 11 a.m. on CBSSN. The SWAC at 1 p.m. on ESPNU will have Southern playing Alabama State.

At 3:30 p.m. the WAC in Las Vegas will be contested between Abilene Christian and top seed Cal Baptist, while at 4 p.m. top seed Howard and Norfolk State will play for the MEAC crown on ESPNEWS.

Louisiana Tech, the top seed, meets Missouri State at 5:30 p.m. on CBSSN for the crown in Conference USA, while the American will be between top seed Rice and UTSA at 9:30 p.m. on ESPNU.

On Sunday, besides the Patriot, the Northeast Conference at noon on ESPNU will feature Long Island U at top seed, defending champion, and host FDU, coached by former Villanova star Stephanie Gaitley.

Saturday’s CAA semifinal winners will play at 2 p.m. on CBSSN, the same time the Missouri Valley Conference championship will air on ESPN2.