The last college basketball game of the year has been played! March Madness is over and I can’t feel my face. In last night’s final, Texas A&M beat Notre Dame 76-70. It wasn’t always pretty, but it was so very entertaining. Lots of pointing in the air.
A lot of people have praised last night’s championship game for being everything the men’s championship was not: exciting, close, experiencing sudden changes in momentum, actually resembling a game of basketball and not a bunch of little kids trying to throw rocks on a roof. People think by acknowledging this one game it makes them superior. That by giving the Women’s NCAA Championship game the respect it deserves they are all of a sudden a fierce advocate of women’s athletics. It pisses me off. The women’s tournament this year was enthralling on its own two feet. No comparison necessary. The team, the players, the stories, the emotion — it was all real. It’s sad that it took Butler’s men’s basketball team to show the world how fun the women’s game can be.
On to the game: The first ten minutes were a big pile of WTF. Both teams looked like they were really feeling the pressure of what it meant to be on that stage. I imagine those feelings are only intensified when virtually no one but you and your momma expected you to be there. Notre Dame got way more than a taste of the defense Texas A&M is known for resulting in seven turnovers in the first six and a half minutes. Midway into the half, the Irish turned it around. Someone finally heard me through the TV screen because they started getting the ball into the post. Devereaux Peters came alive and had 10 points by the close of the half. She finished with 21 points and 11 rebounds.
At the start of the second half, we finally got the guard match-up we were looking forward to. Sydney Colson (10 points, 5 assists) was back in after picking up three fouls in the first half and Skylar Diggings (23 points, 4 steals) found her touch around the basket. They were all over each other. I think Colson may have gotten to first base.
Danielle Adams remembered she was an All-American (it’s easy to forget these things) and went off. She scored 22 points in the second half to finish with 30. Adams turned in a great second half performance, but the game might have taken a very different turn if it weren’t for the heroics of Tyra White. You might recall that White hit the game winner vs. Stanford. With two seconds on the shot clock and 1:07 left in the game, she hit a 3 pointer to extend the lead to 73-68. She finished with 18 points. Eighteen extremely important points that got overshadowed by Adams’ second half burst.
The Aggies’ coach Gary Blair, possibly the most adorable old guy of all time, became the oldest women’s coach to win it all at 65. This was also the first win in school history. Blair said, “We might not play the prettiest game in the world but it’s good for women’s basketball to see a Texas A&M and a Notre Dame in this game.” Do you agree? Are you tired of seeing the same teams in the championship every year?
First off, let me say that living in The Netherlands officially sucked this year because of this incredible March Madness run. I was awake until 4 AM watching the game online, and I do not regret one second of it!
Between the Sydneys and Skylar, I’m not sure which had my blood pressure climbing, but I can say that even though I’m sad the lovely Ms. Diggins and the Irish (my favourite team, second only to Duke) didn’t win it all, I congratulate Texas A&M on a fantastic game and yes…yes I am tired of seeing the same teams in the championship game, I was literally exhausted with seeing UConn (men’s or women’s) in the final. It’s why I freaked out and took the day off when ND beat UConn. Maya Moore is incredible, but Auriemma had it right when he said “it’s their turn” (albeit bitterly) about Notre Dame.
And I’m in complete agreement with you on the superiority complex some people have developed just because they happened to watch this game. My entire circle of friends, men and women alike, were either commending both teams for their style of play (which they had no clue about, since they haven’t been into women’s sports for that long) or rattling off “the hot one, Skylar Diggins” stats as though they forgot I used to play ball and hence have been watching Diggins since she was in high school. Lol not only is it annoying for me, it’s embarrassing for them. Anyway…I’ll cut my ramble short. Great post, great points made and a great game, one of the greatest…I look forward to whoever’s got next!
I’m a huge Seattle Storm fan. I can’t wait to see how my Storm will handle Maya Moore when she enters the big leagues.
I caught the men’s game and it was sad. You had the perfect description of it: “a bunch of little kids trying to throw rocks on a roof”. I think I turned it off early and watched Scrubs on Netflix.
But last night’s game was AMAZING. I was decked out in my maroon and had marked a plus sign on my hand to “be positive”. Those girls came to play. And yeah, I love Colson, Carter and Adams but White is the Silent Assassin. There is something so quiet about her on the court that I love watching. But, like she said after the game, she’s “not silent anymore.”
We need teams like Notre Dame and Texas A&M playing the big games. It lets other teams see that they can make it. When I was at Texas A&M, you couldn’t give away basketball tickets. Somewhere out there, there’s another school in that same rut. Will they be national champions in 11 years? Maybe. That’s the cool thing about college sports.
As much as I wanted to see UConn take the win, I think it’s a good thing they didn’t. It gives women’s basketball a chance to get bigger exposure and hopefully a bigger fan base. Maybe that alum at A&M who didn’t care about women’s basketball a few years ago will think about changing that now.
This game also shows that there aren’t only two really good teams and everyone else isn’t any good, but that there are a lot of talented players out there.
Yes and yes, this game was amazing. Thanks for the tournament updates!
More than anything else, I think I enjoyed following this tournament with Autostraddle! Awesome article series, I hope we can continue to talk about ladysports on autostraddle in the future. :)
the Women’s World Cup is this summer (yes, I’m already excited for it), so we can hopefully talk more ladysports in a couple months :)
sooo watching that.
I agree! Great to see a little sports discussion on here. You did a great job covering the tourney Brittani.
To answer your question, as I’ve mentioned before, if we don’t see another Uconn or Tenn team win in the next decade I’m happy.
Last night was an awesome game. That 3 with 2 seconds on the shot clock made the difference in the game for the Aggies. Can someone please explain to me though why the women don’t have the 10-second rule to cross half court? This really threw me off.
I think it’s one of those random things that happened once women’s basketball started to grow and they were changing rules and no one has made too big of a fuss over it so it’s never been bumped. They figure the shot clock is enough? Spending more than ten seconds bringing the ball up is pretty silly. But the defense is definitely punished without it because just knowing you only have ten seconds to get the ball up while being pressed is a nagging stress factor in the back of your head. I wouldn’t be opposed to them adding it. It’s on every other level of basketball.
As difficult it is for this longhorn to say….GO AGGIES!
haha…you’re a good sport. I cheered for Texas when they played up here in Portland for the soccer playoffs.
Being a supporter of Maya, Coach Auriemma, his staff, and their standard of excellence, I am very happy to see other schools move up into the limelight. Everyone benefits.
Brittani gets a Brilliant Writing Award for the beautiful observation concerning Sydney Colson and Skylar Diggins: “They were all over each other. I think Colson may have gotten to first base.” Very quiet, very tasteful, and very funny, especially accompanying that photo.
Incidentally, since many have commented on Skylar’s physical attractiveness, do not sleep on the absolute fact that Sydney Colson is (also) one of the world’s beautiful women.
And yes, I’m in favor of adding a ten-second rule for getting to half-court.
“The women’s tournament this year was enthralling on its own two feet. No comparison necessary.”- perfectly said. There’s a great book about gender and sports called Taking The Field that this article reminded me of.
I was halfway excited to go out to a bar near the Butler campus and watch the men’s game, just for the experience of seeing a different school’s fans. When that plan fell through though I ended up watching with a few friends, zoning out five minutes in, then leaving at half time to work on homework out of sheer boredom. I generally like the men’s games but that match up was just a total failure and possibly the worst example of what the sport’s all about.
The women’s match, on the other hand, did just about everything right. I can’t deny how happy I am that A&M took home the title but I’m being entirely honest in saying I would have been happy for Notre Dame to win too. It was just a great match up between two schools who both deserve more recognition than they’ve gotten playing a sport that deserves so much more recognition too.
Never fear that Tyra White was overshadowed by Daniel Adams, at least when it comes to the support she’s getting from students on campus. Just about any Aggie who follows sports knows what it means when someone says The Shot but it’s quickly becoming redefined to include what White did for us these past two games and really her whole career here. Don’t forget, she has another season to no longer be silent.
I loved this! I tried to watch as many broadcasting’s as possible up here haha half was in french somehow but yeahhh this is wicked!!! Autostraddle this rocks!
also there should be a complete sports section :D This would be amazing :D
Thanks again Brittani!
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