By Ashleigh Sargent and Mariah Philips

Notre Dame: The Fighting Irish took down perennial powerhouse UConn in overtime to advance to the National Championship for the second year in a row.  Behind the leadership of Skylar Diggins, who finished the night with 19 points, Notre Dame forced the game into overtime after falling behind the Huskies with less than ten seconds in regulation.  Natalie Novosel put back a clutch offensive board to tie the game with 4.6 seconds left and eventually finished with a team-high of 20 points.  Notre Dame dominated overtime, getting two key three-pointers from Brittany Mallory and scoring the final eight points to secure a spot in the Championship. Analysis: The combination of solid perimeter play and relentless toughness clinched the victory.

Baylor: Despite getting just 13 points total from Brittany Griner, Baylor’s strong second half secured the victory over the Stanford Cardinal.  Terran Condrey came up big off the bench for the Bears adding 13 points.  On the defensive end, Destiny Williams grabbed eight defensive boards to finish with a team-high ten rebounds.  Even though Stanford doubled down on Griner, her height and athleticism proved to be too much to handle down the stretch.  Analysis: Both teams struggled offensively, but in the end, Baylor’s defensive efforts won the game for them. Even though Nnemkadi Ogwumike scored 22 points, the Bears managed to hold the rest of the Stanford roster to single digit scoring.

 The Big Game: This Championship matchup will be an interesting one as it features strong guard play on Notre Dame’s side versus Baylor’s tough inside game anchored by Brittany Griner.  Notre Dame will be persistent and scrappy in the front court and will have to rely on the leadership of their guards to control the pace and cause havoc on defense.  Conversely, Baylor will need a big performance from their post players.  If Baylor can consistently feed the ball down low and follow up misses with put-backs, they will be hard to stop with a much smaller Notre Dame team.

 The Pick: We predict that the next National Champion will be Baylor based on their flawless record of 39-0 and an unmatchable size advantage.  Notre Dame is a small team to begin with and Brittany Griner has been virtually unstoppable, even by teams with a strong post game.  The Fighting Irish will live up to their name and hang with the Bears for at least the first half, but eventually size will win out and Notre Dame will start to fall behind.  Unless the Notre Dame guards have an outstanding shooting day from behind the arc, it will be close to impossible for them to outscore Baylor.  In this David versus Goliath-esque matchup, we have Goliath getting the victory and securing a perfect 40-0 record.

Ashleigh Sargent is a 6′ forward for Wellesley College and Mariah Philips is a Wellesley varsity softball player.

When Stanford went down 63-62 last night to Texas A & M, it took several minutes to sink in. And when TV cameras showed the UConn Huskies in the stands, well, you felt that they had been forewarned: Watch out, things can happen.

It didn’t matter. Notre Dame didn’t care that they weren’t supposed to (really) win, that the script was for them to play well, but then give way to the anointed Huskies.

In sports, as in life, underdogs are delightfully dangerous – and even though Maya Moore scored 36 points, it wasn’t enough for a team determined to dog and harass – and score their own buckets. They took it 72-63, in a stunning upset that – yes – heralds a new era for women’s college basketball.

OK, this is not the first time there have been upsets (remember 2006 when Maryland’s Kristi Toliver won it with a 3-point shot at the buzzer in overtime against Duke?)

But this is the first year there have been enough upsets (Gonzaga over UCLA and then Louisville. Texas A&M over Baylor. Tennessee out to Notre Dame) – to throw our once easy-to-complete brackets out of whack. (No one in my pool predicted a Texas A&M-Notre Dame championship game. Did anyone in America?)

We now have it –March Madness instead of the March Mandate.

Yes, you feel for Maya Moore ending her UConn career without another championship. But that failure does not diminish her as a player or what she’s accomplished at UConn. Yes, there are new names on people’s lips this morning: Skylar Diggins, Natalie Novosel, Brittany Mallory; and for Texas A & M, Sydney Colson and Tyra White.

Maya may be leaving, but don’t expect her to disappear. This woman has a future on and off the court.

But there is more reason than ever to tune in and not just “follow” women’s college basketball, but watch. Carefully. Because anything can happen.

By Laura Pappano

It’s March Madness for a reason. Yes, UConn is dominant, but with injuries and defections, and rising teams from Baylor, Stanford, and Tennessee, who knows? This is college, after all.

Too much March Madness talk presumes that it’s all about the men’s bracket. But if the waiter who just served us dinner can have his men’s partially filled-out men’s bracket folded and tucked into his back pocket, women can catch the fire, too. Brackets are about collegiality, competition — and getting through mud season.

Yes, it looks like office-cooler fun and games, but its more than that. This is political because filling out brackets is about committing to watch, and talk, and follow. It is about building a fanbase. The friendly office pool should not only track the men’s side of the NCAA (as too many do).  So, go ahead, be a revolutionary and run your own using the women’s brackets. Print them here. Collect them by Friday. Watch the play starting on Saturday.

Go ahead and enjoy the power. It’s like voting in a non-election year.

Here we go — yet again! After a spectacular season (78 straight wins and counting…) and off-season that saw the UConn Women’s Basketball team walking the red carpet at the ESPY Awards and visiting Walter Reed Medical Center and The White House (again), the university’s athletic office is still treating their games like discount fare.

The UConn athletic department has announced the 2010-2011 schedule – and set its ticket prices. It will cost $22 to see the NCAA DI Championship women — and $30 to see the men.

For those who order season tickets for one of the two venues at which the teams play – Gampel Pavilion in Storrs or the XL Center in Hartford – there are discounted prices that are equally insulting: $15 to see the women; $25 to see the men.

It’s tempting to begin a debate about whether any given UConn men’s game is worth $8 or $10 more than any given UConn women’s game.

I say “tempting” because this may be the year to retire the old argument that guys dunking = more entertainment, says who? But then, this year we have the drama of watching an historic run given that the UConn women have just produced back-to-back perfect seasons. Can they keep the streak alive?

Rather than have this debate, however, let’s consider a story this week in USA Today pointing out how much non-athletes are charged to support college sports. At UConn, according to the paper’s analysis, 4.8 percent of student tuition goes to athletics. The point: athletics is not a separate business but part of the university operations and — such charges suggest – a key part of the college experience.

Like it or not, pricing is a signal of status. (Think: pricing and branding of clothes, cars – even food and coffee.) Why should students whose tuition dollars support both men’s and women’s sports help finance a system that treats female athletes as second class?

So here’s a word problem: #23 Maya Moore, also a member of the USA World Championship team,  has the ball and she’s driving to the basket. The team she plays on has yielded 7 NCAA titles, 9 national players of the year, 11 first-round WNBA draft picks, and 24 first-team all-america selections.

So what is the defense for charging  less because her team — and not the men’s — is on the court?

VS.?

By Laura Pappano

Baylor Coach Kim Mulkey has a number in mind: 47,492.

That’s how many fans went wild last Sunday in Houston for the men’s Baylor-Duke matchup. After her team upset Duke in a thrilling 51-48 win last night, Mulkey made the point: She wants the same support in San Antonio for her Baylor team as they head to the Final Four.

“It’s good to get back home,” she said in post-game interview with ESPN’s Holley Rowe. “I want everybody in the state to show us the same kind of a fan base we had in Houston for our men. We’re home. Come on, you are going to see the best team in the country in Connecticut if they win the next one – and let’s just go play.”

Mulkey is not the only one who thinks a UConn-Baylor contest is worth coming out – or tuning in – for. The ESPN desk jockeys (who made sure to mention that they don’t watch a much women’s basketball), nonetheless admitted that seeing Brittany Griner & Co. take on UConn is appointment viewing.

And why wouldn’t it be?

Well, because despite thrilling play (the second game last night, Xavier-Stanford was decided at the buzzer as Jeanette Pohlon released the game-winning layup as time expired) there remains an apologetic stance toward women’s basketball. Real sports fans, we hear ad-nauseam, don’t like it.

“Most of us don’t care about the women’s tournament,” wrote Dan Shaughnessy in Sports Illustrated. “Sorry. I know this is not the politically correct stance and I know there are young women all over the nation who rightfully look up to the Huskies as role models, but the fact remains that most red-blooded American fans don’t give a hoot about women’s basketball…”

What’s so funny about the don’t-make-me-watch-women-play stance is that same tired arguments (big one: slower play) might well be applied as an excuse to forgo men’s college play for the NBA. The bottom line is that, having watched my share of men’s and women’s games this month, it’s impossible to say that the men’s games are really more exciting to watch than the women’s.

It’s about the match-ups.

Sure, UConn has been dominant this season, but who doesn’t want to see if Brittney Griner (transformed from punch-throwing heathen to “freshman sensation”) can keep Tina Charles and Maya Moore from the hoop?

UConn will need some serious three-pointers because Griner (and her tenacious young teammates) are tough to beat inside (Griner has an NCAA tournament record 35 blocked shots in four games, 218 for the season – so far).

Don’t show up in San Antonio or tune in because you think you should. I believe women should support women’s sports. But this isn’t about that. This is about compelling play, the David and Goliath contest that doesn’t come along every day, but is – at the core — why we watch sports in the first place.

47,492 is the number to beat.

There may be other ways to judge progress, but this year’s NCAA Women’s DI Basketball Tournament offers signs worth noting:

1. PRESIDENTIAL PICKS. For the first time, President Obama filled out NCAA DI Basketball brackets — for the women’s tournament. (See image at right — or click here.)

Last year, we noticed that although he invited the UConn women to the White House and played some hoops, that he’d never filled out a bracket. Now that his top men’s pick — Kansas — is out of contention, maybe he will lean on the women to make him look good. (Wouldn’t be the first time).

2. PACKED STANDS. Another tournament positive is that — unlike some past years — the stands at first and second-round games look pretty packed. While that may be the result of TV angles or strategic seating by the hosts, it was easy in past year tournaments to see lots of open chairbacks. Some of this may be that several of the games are hosted by home teams, but not all. Consider last night’s stunning 72-71 Gonzaga win over Texas A&M in front of revved-up fans — at the University of Washington, a neutral site.

Perhaps the crowds — or the appearance of crowds — reflect a recognition about the intensity and entertainment value of the women’s game. (Should we blame amped-up intensity  for recent high-profile aggression, as a New York Times story suggests? Unclear.)

3. NO WHINING ABOUT “PARITY.” It is refreshing to see that even though coaches of top teams put Connecticut on a different level than everyone else, we aren’t hearing that annoying word — “parity” — and that the women’s side lacks it.

Connecticut is dominant this year, but unlike the old days when UConn and Tennessee plucked all the best players, there is talent all around Division I. This doesn’t mean the same old cranks won’t complain that women aren’t worth watching. It’s just that fewer people seem to believe them.

Everybody knows that President Obama is a big college hoops fan. But most of his public affection has focused on the men’s side (click here to see a photo of him with his March Madness picks). Today, however, he had the chance to enumerate the dominance of the University of Connecticut Women’s Basketball team — this particular team with it’s 39-0 season — and the program with six of the last 15 NCAA titles and three undefeated regular seasons. (click here for a photo of Obama and the team).

He made the point in his formal remarks (before inviting the players to shoot around on his private court beyond camera view) that “for this team, an undefeated season just wasn’t enough — they became the first team in NCAA history, men or women’s, to win every single game by double digits, which is just an unbelievable, unbelievable statistic.”

He also emphasized their academic success and the program’s 100-percent graduation rate (see what happens when college isn’t merely a ticket-punch-stop on the way to the pros?)

But most striking was the way he talked about this team as the father of daughters: “And thanks to players like each of these women and those who came before them, our young women today look at themselves differently, especially tall young women, like my daughters.”

There was more — about the “positive example to which our daughters can aspire — to be healthy and active, to be part of a team.”

He offered familiar feel-good phrases that 1) are actually true for the NCAA female athletes he mentioned and 2) are rarely applied to male college athletes and 3) make me woozy.

It is the constant conflict between — well — being Bad Ass and being virtuous. Being viewed as serious stuff and being framed as grown-up versions of girls in ponytails playing community sports on Saturdays.

YET — we need not have this conflict. Frankly, it’s time for college sports programs, fans, public and media to treat female athletes — not like little sisters — but equal partners with men’s programs. (And in the process, maybe we could sprinkle the guy’s side with a little of that role-model, college-graduation dust).

For those who love to bring it all back to markets (and colleges are NOT markets), consider that women’s college basketball offers a serious growth opportunity in expanding fan bases (note: big mailing to fathers of tall girls). The men’s side may be maxed out. (How much more can people honestly pay for tickets — or the opportunity to purchase tickets?)

Maybe next year, the White House can also share a photo of the First Family with their picks for the 2010 NCAA March Madness tournament — on the women’s side.

Now that would be Bad Ass and virtuous.

The big game is tonight! Before the NCAA’s D1 Women’s Basketball March to the Arch, I spoke with Cathy Inglese, former head coach at Boston College whose teams made it to the tournament six of the last eight years (plus were Big East Champions in 2004). She has spent this year visiting the nation’s top programs, watching games and practices — and getting a veteran’s courtside view of women’s D1 basketball.

FGN: What makes women’s basketball today special?
CI: What makes the women’s game so exciting to watch is the teamwork both offensively and defensively. The play is very team-oriented and this year the players are stronger, more skilled, and more athletic than ever before. For example, you’ve got players like Courtney Paris who are consistently recording double-double games – that’s double digit points and double-digit rebounds.

FGN: How does such a team-oriented game translate into to how this tournament has progressed?
CI: The most interesting thing about this year’s bracket was its parity. Besides UConn, who I think play on a level above that of the other teams, on any given night any of the top 50 teams could beat each other. What it came down to was the matchups, how each team’s particular dynamics played out against their opponent’s. It’s not always the best talent that determines the win.

FGN: What should we expect to see from University of Connecticut?
CI: UConn portrays a real team dynamic; they practice hard and really play together and mesh together as a team.

FGN: Which players should we be watching in tonight’s game?
CI: Maya Moore from UConn, for one. She is an energetic player who works hard all the time. You’ll notice in tonight’s game how unselfish she is. She’s extremely athletic, but she also meshes well with her teammates. Maya’s teammate Renee Montgomery is great point guard for the team and a big scorer. She distributes the ball very well, getting the ball to the player that’s open. She makes those people around her better. Look for Angel McCoughtry and Candyce Bingham tonight as well, playing for Louisville.

FGN: Thanks so much for your insight, Coach Inglese. So, do you plan to get back into college coaching?
CI: Absolutely. I love what I’ve been able to do during this year as far as visiting other teams and meeting coaches around the country, but being part of a team is what I’m really missing right now. I’m chomping at the bit to get back into coaching.

Savanna Johnson is a Wellesley College senior and swimmer who is a three-time NCAA qualifier and two-time NCAA Academic All-American. She holds NEWMAC conference and meet records in the 50 yard freestyle. Johnson (who also runs track) holds Wellesley College records in seven swimming and three track events.

Her player profile doesn’t mention it, but Boston College guard Ayla Brown, has a killer voice that earned her a contestant’s spot in the fifth season of American Idol. She was a regular before home games, belting out the anthem – and then stepping on the court.

Ditto for UConn phenom #23 Maya Moore and teammate #41 Kaili McLaren (okay, they did it as a tribute to the team’s seniors, but they sounded pretty good). And then Stanford forward/guard Michelle Harrison teamed up with Hookslide before the Stanford men tipped off against Cal State Bakersfield last month. I wonder how that rangy-maned shock-jock would sound…