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Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Paris, OU too much for Prairie View A&M

IOWA CITY, Iowa — Simply put, Courtney Paris is a force of nature. Paris scored 11 points, grabbed 16 rebounds and blocked four shots to help the Oklahoma Sooners blow past Prairie View A&M 76-47 in the opening round of the women’s NCAA Tournament on Sunday night. “Courtney Paris proved tonight that she’s the anchor of her team,” Prairie View coach Cynthia Cooper-Dyke said. But Paris did not have to carry the load alone.

The top-seeded Sooners (29-4) have a treasure trove of talent and put it all on display in an ESPN-televised game. Starters Danielle Robinson and Ashley Paris combined for 29 points, and Oklahoma’s bench outscored the Lady Panthers’ 20-3. The Lady Panthers (23-11) planned to play an up-tempo style to throw the Sooners off-balance. It was Oklahoma, however, that largely dictated the pace of play.

PVAMU Panthers athletic director Fred Washington

The Sooners went on a 20-8 run midway through the first 20 minutes, but Prairie View managed to hang around. Dominique Smith, who matched Gaati Werema as the Panthers’ leading scorer, scored 13 of her 15 points in the first half, and Prairie View trailed just 38-28 heading into intermission. Prairie View struggled in the second half, shooting just 18.2 percent (6-for-33) from the floor

Stats Notes View gallery

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Saturday, March 21, 2009

A&T embraces challenge: Coach and two stars have been here before

DULUTH, Ga. -- The NCAA women's basketball tournament selection committee finally gave the MEAC a little respect Monday night, designating N.C. A&T as a No. 14 seed rather than the usual No. 16. That doesn't mean the Aggies won't have a major first-round challenge when they face third-seeded Florida State at 2:30 p.m. today in the Arena at Gwinnett Center. The Seminoles (25-7) are ranked No. 12 nationally and shared first place in the ACC with Maryland during the regular season. The Terps got a No. 1 seed for the tournament, as did Duke, the team that knocked off FSU in a semifinal of the ACC tournament.

A MEAC team has never won a women's NCAA tournament game in the event's 28-year history. N.C. A&T, though, showed what it is capable of with a victory over A-10 champion Charlotte this season, and the Aggies (26-6) have a couple other things in their favor. Although this is N.C. A&T's first NCAA trip since 1994, coach Patricia Cage-Bibbs joins senior standouts Amber Bland and Brittanie Taylor-James with March Madness experience.

This is the seventh tournament for Cage-Bibbs, who previously guided Grambling and Hampton to the tournament. Bland played on a NCAA team as a freshman at Penn State, while Taylor-James did the same at UC-Santa Barbara. "Our kids deserve to be here and they are going to do their very best," Cage-Bibbs said.

GAME TIME: 2:30 P.M. EDT TODAY--ESPN2

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All-MEAC Brittanie Taylor-James, 6-0 senior forward from Evanston, IL makes a return to the NCAA Tournament.

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AGGIES HAVE GEORGIA ON THEIR MINDS

Friday, March 20, 2009

OU Griffin overwhelming vs. Morgan State Bears

Post Game: The Sooners dominated in just about every way, outrebounding the Bears 45-36, shooting 60 percent while holding Morgan State to 29 percent and drawing only 11 fouls to Morgan State's 24.

Game Photo Gallery

KANSAS CITY, Mo. Morgan State's first visit to the NCAA tournament lasted only as long as likely national player of the year Blake Griffin wished for the Bears to linger around. The 15th-seeded Bears quickly learned a lesson that the bruised Big 12 absorbed all season: Griffin is one of the few players in the country capable of eviscerating an opponent on his own. The sophomore forward scored 28 points and added 13 rebounds while shooting 11-for-12 from the floor as second-seeded Oklahoma cruised to an 82-54 victory in a South Region first-round game at Sprint Center before 17,398.

With little hope of containing Griffin, the Bears resorted to tactics usually reserved for the realm of professional wrestling. Morgan State's Ameer Ali got tangled with Griffin chasing a rebound, then reached behind and slammed Griffin to the ground to earn an immediate ejection with 7:41 remaining. The Sooners (28-5) advanced to a second-round meeting with 10th-seeded Michigan (21-13) on Saturday.

Reggie Holmes scored 14 points to lead the Bears (23-12), the MEAC champions whose first NCAA appearance coincided with coach Todd Bozeman's return. He was just a few years removed from a decade in exile from the college game after incurring a show-cause penalty for infractions committed at California.

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Thursday, March 19, 2009

Been There: Cage-Bibbs has experience in tournament, even if N.C. A&T players don't

Patricia Cage-Bibbs, who took over at N.C. A&T four seasons ago, has a 423-244 career coaching record. The Lady Aggies will battle a talented Florida State Seminoles team that may be the region's favorite to advance.

One of the luxuries that N.C. A&T will have in the NCAA Women's Tournament is the experience of Coach Patricia Cage-Bibbs. Cage-Bibbs has taken two other programs to the tournament (Grambling and Hampton) and knows about all of the hype surrounding the postseason. "You don't get caught up in all of that," she said. "What I'm going to do is just tell them it's a great opportunity, and you just play and execute, and if we do that we'll be trouble for some teams."

The Aggies, regular-season and tournament champions in the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference, are the 14th seed in the Trenton Regional and will play No. 3 Florida State at 2:30 Saturday in Duluth, Ga. "A 14th seed just shows the kind of respect these young ladies have earned over the last two seasons," said Cage-Bibbs, whose Aggies have the highest seed ever for a MEAC team. "We are excited, but we are not just happy to be there. We're going to come ready to play."

Lady Aggies junior guard Ta'Wuana "Tweet" Cook, Fayetteville, N.C. Seventy-First H.S., is ready to play the FSU Seminoles.

This will be A&T's first trip to the NCAA Tournament since 1994, but the Aggies gained some postseason experience last season in the WNIT, where they lost to South Carolina 102-74. Cage-Bibbs, who has had just four losing seasons in her 23-year career, took over at A&T four seasons ago and has turned her program into one of the MEAC's best.

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Redemption: Bozeman back in the Dance with Morgan State

Morgan State coach Todd Bozeman is back in the NCAA tournament after a 13-year absence after he was dismissed at California for NCAA violations. "I wanted to show I could do it again and I could do it right and it really was an aberration," he says. "It was a decision I made that was costly, and I use it with my children, with my players. There are consequences for your actions, and you have to think carefully before you do things.

VIEW FREE --MORGAN ST. VS. OU GAME LIVE @ 9:55 ET ON CBS: http://mmod.ncaa.com/

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Todd Bozeman still aches. Once one of college basketball's most promising young coaches, then an admitted cheat, he has spent more than a decade in recovery. Three years ago, he found work again at Morgan State. Today, in his first NCAA tournament game since 1996, Bozeman and the Bears will try to engineer a first-round upset of No. 2-seeded Oklahoma. "To me," he says, "it begins and ends with the fact that I'm coaching. All the other stuff is gravy."

The sins of his past were egregious, however. Bozeman, then at California, doled out cash to a coveted recruit even as the school and the NCAA were finishing up an earlier case involving secondary violations by the program. Perhaps justly, his healing can never be complete. Bozeman was exiled by the NCAA for eight years and untouchable — all but unhirable —- for awhile after that. His father remained his staunchest ally, preaching patience, assuring his son that everyone makes mistakes and new opportunities inevitably arrive. But less than four months before one finally did at Morgan State, Ira Bozeman was diagnosed with lung cancer. A month later, he died at 67.

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MSU Bears All-MEAC guard Reggie Holmes, 6-4/180 Junior, Baltimore, MD, St. Frances HS.

Totally Unbelievable! Morgan State and Coach Todd Bozeman articles are dominating the newspapers and Internet today---from USA Today, New York Times, San Francisco Chronicle, Dallas Morning News, Baltimore Sun....147 articles... Coach Bozeman and Morgan State is hot, hot, hot!!! GO BEARS!!!

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Morehead States Defeats Alabama State In Play-In Game

ASU and the SWAC suffered another embarrassing loss with the 7-foot Chief ending his Hornet career scoring 0 points and 2 rebounds against Morehead State. A record crowd of 11,346 at the Dayton Arena and a national television audience watched the "not made for TV" affair.

Morehead State didn't need a Chief on the boards to get its first NCAA victory in a 25 years. Center Kenneth Faried got the better of his bigger and more syllabic counterpart Tuesday night, and the Eagles never trailed during a 58-43 victory over Alabama State that opened the NCAA Tournament and ended a quarter-century of futility for Morehead State.

Morehead State (20-15) played its way into a first-round rematch Friday with top-seeded Louisville in the Midwest Regional. Alabama State (22-10) hoped to set the tone defensively behind shot-blocker Grlenntys Chief Kickingstallionsims Jr., a 7-foot-1 center whose reach is as long as his name. He swatted away three shots, but wasn't much help where he was needed most — on the boards.

Faried, the Ohio Valley Conference's defensive player of the year, had 14 points and 21 rebounds. The Eagles dominated the boards, 50-27. Andrew Hayles scored 14 for Alabama State. Morehead State hadn't made the tournament since 1984. The Eagles beat North Carolina A&T in an opening game that featured the first TV replay used to settle a tournament dispute.

Box Score » Watch Replay » Play‑By‑Play »
Photos »

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Another confirmation that Alabama State and SWAC Basketball sucks! Should the NCAA take away the SWAC's automatic bid and move to a 64 game format? Who can debate the results--0 and whatever! Nobody remembers the last time the SWAC won a NCAA tournament game. How can you not be prepared and competitive with a 19-15 OVC team that should be a member of the SWAC?

-beepbeep

Prairie View women to face OU in NCAA tourney

PVAMU Coach Cynthia Cooper Dyke says the major difference this year will be confidence because the seven freshmen from two years ago are now seasoned juniors.

Prairie View guard Shondria Combs could hardly contain herself as the Lady Panthers waited for their NCAA Tournament first-round opponent to be revealed Monday night. It seemed like an eternity had passed. But moments into the NCAA Tournament Selection Show’s second segment, Prairie View’s name and its daunting task were revealed. The 16th-seeded Lady Panthers, making their second NCAA Tournament appearance in three years, drew Oklahoma City Regional No.1 seed Oklahoma in Sunday’s opening round in Iowa City, Iowa.

The Lady Panthers and the crowd in Buffalo Wild Wings erupted despite the obstacle ahead. “I was excited about whoever we were going to play,” said Combs, a junior. “Just being here is exciting because everybody doesn’t get to make it here so getting there is exciting.” But that’s about as far as the gracious talk went Monday night. The Panthers, led by fourth-year coach Cynthia Cooper-Dyke, said just being happy to be going to the Big Show was for the first time when they lost to North Carolina in the first round.

This time the Panthers (23-10) are thinking about advancing even as they face one of the most dominant players in college basketball in powerful OU senior post Courtney Paris, who is a 6-foot-4 menace in the paint.

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