March 19, 2011
Postseason Info Guide | Tournament Central | Live Audio | All-AGcess: Press Conference
STANFORD, Calif. - The UC Davis women's basketball team, enjoying the most successful season in its brief four-yesr history at the Div. I level, met the media on Friday and made final preparations for its NCAA Tournament game on Saturday against second-ranked Stanford.
Tipoff for the nationally televised matchup on ESPN2 is scheduled for 3:30 p.m. but is expected to start closer to 3:50 p.m. and follows the earlier matchup between eighth-seeded Texas Tech and ninth-seeded St. John's.
The game will also be available online through ESPN3.com.
UC Davis, which carries a season-best six-game winning streak into Saturday's game, traveled to Palo Alto on Friday morning and practiced in the late afternoon at legendary Maples Pavilion. The Aggies met with the media prior to practice.
"We have tremendous respect for what Stanford has accomplished and with what Tara (VanderVeer's) accomplished over the years, and we're excited to have this matchup," said Aggie coach Sandy Simpson at a pre-tournament press conference. "It's daunting in some ways. When you look at their personnel and the system they run, they don't have a lot of holes in their system. They're pretty strong all the way around.
"But I feel we do some good things too and there's some things they're going to have to prepare for with us. Our team has probably been playing our best basketball over the past three weeks or so, at both ends of the court. So, we're excited to take the court against Stanford and see what happens."
VanderVeer, whose team ended top-ranked Connecticut's 90-game winning streak earlier this season, has been impressed with UC Davis.
"They run a great system, as Jeanette (Pohlen) says, they run the Princeton offense, they execute it really well and their extended 2-1-2 defense is very effective," she said. "It is to our team's advantage that we have played them a couple times, three times in the last three years. I think it is also to their advantage. They have been here two of the last three years and they are not intimidated coming into Maples. We know we will have to play very well."
The Aggies are making their first-ever appearance in the NCAA Tournament after beating top-seeded Cal Poly to capture the Big West Tournament title last weekend. The players are excited about the opportunity to play one of the nation's elite teams.
"When you grow up watching a team like Stanford, you have so much respect for them," said Aggie senior Heidi Heintz. "I played them once with USF and once last year with Davis. And being in the NCAA Tournament adds an additional nervous factor, you could say. But we're really excited. They're a great team and we have a lot of respect for them. It'll be fun."
The trip to the NCAA Tournament has been especially satisfying for the Aggie players who set a goal to make the 64-team field for 14th-year head coach Sandy Simpson. He announced prior to the season that this would be his last.
"It's been awesome to play for him the last five years," Paige Mintun said. "Our biggest goal was to get to the NCAA Tournament for him for the first time in school history. But we don't just want to be here, we want to make a statement."
