The Guru’s Daily March Madness Report: South Carolina and UCLA Meet for NCAA Glory

 By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

PHOENIX, Ariz. — Late Sunday afternoon, in what has become the latter-day replacement in the former UConn-Tennessee rivalry by the rise of Hall of Fame Dawn Staley’s South Carolina squad, the Gamecocks will come back one year later to take back the NCAA women’s championship — their fourth — from the one the Huskies claimed last April in Tampa, Fla., in a lopsided victory, their 12th in the title game — or UCLA will ascend to the top of the mountain in women’s collegiate basketball for the first time since becoming AIAW winners in 1978 before the 1982 arrival of the current national governing body of women’s sports.

The title game tips off at 3:30 p.m. in the East on ABC.

South Carolina got its direct revenge Friday night here in the Mortgage Matchup Center with a suffocating defense to win 62-48 with a controversial ending by Hall of Fame UConn coach Geno Auriemma going off in a tirade during the postgame handshakes and later in his postgame press conference.

Saturday, Auriemma issued an apology in a statement over his behavior.

UCLA, which behind UConn’s unbeaten run that lasted until Friday had been No. 2 late in the season with just one loss, avenging the early season setback to Texas in a defensive battle resulting in a 51-44 win over Texas, which otherwise would have been an all-SEC final.

A Bruins win could set a path with their first NCAA title, last year was their first Final Four since following up in 1979 with a second AIAW national semifinals, that was similar when the Gamecocks reached the promised land in 2017 and have since been the equivalent of the Huskies in the last decade.

A year ago, UCLA was routed by UConn in the semifinals and have been on a mission ever since under Cori Close to finish the job this season.

Staley is focused on making sure that doesn’t happen on the Gamecocks’ expense, while a UCLA victory would also give the Big Ten their first women’s champion since Purdue won over Duke in 1999.

“It’s special, I mean, it’s special,”  Staley said of winning the first title. “You’re  playing on the last day of college women’s basketball. It’s a great honor and a great feat whether  you won or lose.

“You also are measuring where your program can continue to go. For us, 2017, we won it. I’m hoping that’s not the same for UCLA on Sunday.”

Current member Maryland was still in the ACC when the Terrapins beat Duke in overtime in Boston in 2006 to claim their only title.

Close, a former Florida State assistant, tipped her hat to the North Philadelphia-born Staley at Saturday’s preview pressers, saying, “Dawn does such a great job and is a standard-bearer in our sport.

“Thankful for what they’ve done, not just for South Carolina, but for the game,” she added.

“We also are an incredibly competitive, confident group. I’m sure they are as well. All you can ask for is to play your best basketball for a national championship.”

On Friday, two newcomers to the Gamecocks were keys to their triumph, freshman Agot Makeer, who has reached  double digits in all five games on the way to the championship, and Florida State transfer Ta’Niya Latson, the nation’s leading scorer in 2025 and the national freshman of the year previously, winning the Tamika Catchings Award from the United States Basketball Writers Association (USBWA) in 2023.

“This is why I came to South Carolina,” Latson said, knowing her scoring might be reduced for the team good this season. “It was a personal sacrifice I had to make. A lot of people don’t understand my why. This is my why. This is why I came to South Carolina.”

Joyce Edwards has been another force for Staley’s group, which suffered a narrow loss in non-conference play to Texas early in the season, and a wider loss to the Longhorns in the SEC championship, and also a loss at Oklahoma on the regular season SEC slate.

UCLA, whose starting lineup is all seniors or graduates, is led by center Lauren Betts, likely to go high in the WNBA collegiate draft next Monday in New York.

That experience drop off next season has caused people to speculate whether Close might take what became the vacant Virginia job Saturday when the university announced the firing of Agugua-Hamilton after the Cavaliers had made the Sweet 16 starting from a narrow First Four win over Arizona State.

The school is Staley’s alma mater, and she said Saturday she had talked to the athletic director but did not learn of a cause.

Later in the day, however, reports surfaced of an internal investigation causing a toxic environment. It is not known if Virginia would pursue Aaron Roussell at nearby Richmond, who built the Spiders into a mid-major force, winning one title three years ago in the Atlantic 10.

Close was a candidate two turns ago when Hall of Famer and WNBA great Tina Thompson took the job in Charlottesville.

Georgia, by mutual agreement, also became open with the departure of Katie Abrahamson-Henderson, while UCF announced the hire of former Tennessee assistant Gabe Lazo for the past two seasons under Kim Caldwell when she succeeded Kellie Harper, being hired from Marshall, which Saturday defeated Illinois State to win the WNIT.

His hire, however, came from LSU, where five days ago he signed on to Kim Mulkey’s staff at LSU.

After a run to the Sweet 16 in the NCAA her first season, Caldwell headed a Tennessee group that had its worst season in decades, finishing with an eight-game losing streak and first round exit from the national tournament, where the legendary Lady Vols coach Pat Summitt won eight titles.

Staley’s name has now been propelled as a coach on a par with Summitt and Auriemma but she blew away being part of any comparisons.

“I don’t really compare myself to anybody when it comes to it,” she said Saturday. “I mean, I do what I do for the coaches that I work with every single day. Those are the people that are in the trenches. Other people outside of us, I’ve never really compared myself to.”

In many ways as a minority Staley has become the new C. Vivian Stringer following the retirement several years ago of the Hall of Fame Rutgers coach.