Women's
Basketball
ISU
Heads to West Lafayette for NCAA Tournament
Send a link to a friend
[March 21, 2008]
NORMAL -- This weekend, the best
teams in women's college basketball will take part in the NCAA
tournament all across the country, and for the first time in three
years, the Illinois State Redbirds are a part of that group. ISU
will stay in the Midwest, needing to drive less than three hours to
Purdue in West Lafayette, Ind., for its fifth all-time appearance in
the NCAA tournament. The 13th-seeded Redbirds (26-6, 13-5 MVC) take
on fourth-seeded Oklahoma (21.8, 11-5 Big 12) in a first-round
matchup on Sunday at 11 a.m. CDT. The game will be shown on ESPN 2,
as a part of the network's roving coverage of the first round, and
WJBC-AM 1230 will broadcast all of the action live.
|
"We are really excited to be a part of the NCAA tournament," said
head coach Robin Pingeton. "Winning the Valley tournament last
weekend was a great thrill, and this is just another fantastic
experience for this team. We had a great practice after a couple of
days off, and we are going to continue to work on our approach
before we face Oklahoma on Sunday. We are going to face a really
good team with a lot of tradition. (Oklahoma junior center) Courtney
Paris is among the elite players in the nation, and it will be fun
to see how we can stack up against them." Redbirds in the NCAA
tournament
Illinois State is making its fifth trip to the NCAA tournament.
The 'Birds are 1-4 in the Big Dance, with their only win coming in
1989. All four teams that the Redbirds have lost to have advanced to
the regional final, including Louisiana Tech, the national runner-up
in 1983, and Baylor, the 2005 national champion. ISU's No. 13 seed
this season is its highest since the field expanded to 64 teams in
1994. ISU has never won consecutive postseason games.
Familiar foes in the field of 64
Two of the teams Illinois State played in the regular season also
made the NCAA tournament field. Miami of Ohio won the Mid-American
Conference Tournament championship to earn its first-ever bid to the
NCAA tournament. The RedHawks (23-10) are seeded 13th in the
Greensboro Region and face fourth-seeded Louisville (24-9) in the
first round on Sunday in Bridgeport, Conn. DePaul (20-11) received
an at-large bid and is also in the Greensboro Region. The
10th-seeded Blue Demons take on seventh-seeded Marist on Saturday in
Baton Rouge, La.
The Illinois State-Oklahoma series
Illinois State and Oklahoma have met twice in women's basketball,
with the Sooners claiming both matchups. The postseason was the
setting of the first matchup, a 67-65 Oklahoma victory in the WNIT.
The next meeting came in the opening round of the George Washington
Classic in 1993. Oklahoma won that game 69-56. Oklahoma is one of
eight teams that Illinois State has played more than once and never
beaten.
[to top of second column]
|
Redbirds win 2008 State Farm MVC Tournament
For the second time ever, Illinois State won the State Farm
Missouri Valley Conference Women's Basketball Tournament. The
Redbirds averaged 71.2 points per game and outscored their opponents
by an average of 9.3 points per game over the three-game stretch. It
was ISU's fourth conference tournament title, after winning the MVC
tournament title in 2005 and Gateway Conference tournament crowns in
1983 and 1989. The Redbirds became the 15th top-seeded team in the
24-year history of the Valley tournament to win the championship.
Trio of Redbirds on all-Valley tournament team
For their performances during the MVC tournament, junior guard
Kristi Cirone, sophomore forward Ashleen Bracey and sophomore guard
Maggie Krick were named to the all-tournament team. Cirone was the
tournament's MVP after averaging 18.7 points per game, including a
season-high-tying 27 points against Southern Illinois. Bracey set
the MVC tournament record with 37 rebounds in the three games and
posted back-to-back 14-point, 16-rebound double-doubles. Krick
averaged 14.3 points per game.
(ISU-Oklahoma
game notes) [To download Adobe Acrobat Reader for
the PDF file, click
here.]
[Text from file received from
Jimmy Knodel,
assistant media relations director,
Illinois
State University]
|