STORRS, Conn. – Like the rest of the women’s college basketball world, the Florida Gators now know that anything is possible, especially since the impossible dream of one team in the field of 64 has come true.
Anything is possible, including beating the undefeated No. 1 team, Connecticut, on its home floor, if unheralded Ball State’s stunning 71-55 drubbing of two-time defending NCAA champion Tennessee Sunday night at Bowling Green, Ky., proved anything.
Coach Amanda Butler’s Gators were still celebrating their tourney-opening 70-57 victory over Temple Sunday afternoon at UConn’s Gampel Pavilion when the Lady Cardinals knocked off Pat Summitt’s Lady Vols, who had never lost in the first two rounds of the tournament.
Of course, this isn’t your usual Tennessee basketball team, which Florida had knocked off during the regular season in Gainesville and which ended its season at 22-11, the most losses ever by a Summitt-coached team.
Nevertheless, the 24-7 Gators now have hope against the 34-0 Huskies who began their quest for a sixth NCAA crown with a 104-65 victory over Vermont just before Florida and Temple took to the floor. Tipoff for the Florida-UConn game is shortly after 7 Tuesday night in front of an expected sellout crowd of 10,027 and the ESPN2 cameras. The winner earns a berth in the Trenton (N.J.) Regional semifinals.
“You have a choice when playing a team like Connecticut,” said Butler, who was a guard for Florida and scored 11 points in the only other meeting between the two teams – a 71-48 loss in the championship game of the Connecticut Classic during the 1991 season. “It can either be an opportunity or a challenge, and we are focused on the opportunity.”
Coach Geno Auriemma’s Huskies never broke a sweat against the Catamounts, running out to a 56-22 halftime lead. Tina Charles led four players in double figures with 32 points (on 13-of-14 shooting) and also had 11 rebounds in 24 minutes of action. Guard Renee Montgomery scored 19 points (7-of-11 shooting) and had 7 assists, while Maya Moore and Kalana Greene each scored 13 points on a combined 12-of-17 shooting.
The Huskies shot 63.1 percent (41 of 65) and were 10-of-23 from beyond the 3-point stripe, with Montgomery hitting 5-of-8. They held Vermont to 46.4 shooting (26 of 56) and almost doubled the Catamounts on the boards, finishing with a 35-18 edge.
For the season, 6-foot sophomore forward Moore is averaging 18.9 points and 8.9 rebounds a game, 6-foot-4 junior center Charles 16.6 points and 8.4 rebounds a game, and 5-foot-7 senior point guard Montgomery 15.9 points and almost 5 assists a game.
Plus, Greene (5-10 junior guard), Caroline Doty (5-10 freshman guard) and Tiffany Hayes (5-10 freshman guard from Winter Haven) all are scoring 8 points a game or more for the Huskies, who have averaged 84.4 points a contest and a 31.7-point margin of victory while shooting 51 percent from the floor and limiting their opponents to 33 percent.
“You can focus on all of those mini things,” Butler said, “or the three or four most important things we have to focus on the next day and a half.
“There are obvious personnel challenges, but I also think we have some great answers for some of those challenges,” Butler continued. “Renee Montgomery is a fantastic player and point guard, but so is Sha Brooks. The same goes for Tina Charles, who had an awesome game (Sunday), but I think it will be another great matchup when her and Marshae (Dotson) go head-to-head on the block.”
Brooks is the Gators’ leading scorer at 16.7 points and almost 5 assists a game, while Dotson is averaging 13.7 points and 6.9 rebounds a game. Junior wing Steffi Sorensen is scoring 9.2 points a game and shooting nearly 40 percent from beyond the 3-point line.
Sunday against the Owls, Brooks had 18 points and 5 assists, Dotson had 13 points and Sorensen had 13 points and a team-high 13 rebounds while hitting 3-of-6 from beyond the 3-point line.
For the Gators to pull off their impossible dream, those three will have to be on top of their games and will need plenty of support from the bench, which produced just 11 points and four rebounds.
“When it comes down to March Madness, they don’t call it that for no reason,” Sorensen said. “Anything can really happen, and watching that Tennessee game gave us a little confidence going into this game knowing the people are beatable. The pressure is really on UConn because everyone’s expecting them to win.
“People weren’t really expecting us to win the first game,” Sorensen added. “We’re just going to go out there and play Florida basketball and see what happens.”
It’s why they play the game.