Hitting the glass

Sporting News, The, March 20, 1995 by David Falkner

In Storrs, Conn., they call it Huskiemania. These days, while there are plenty of long-fanged fans howling for the University of Connecticut's sixth-rated men's team, the real midnight noises are longest and loudest on behalf of the school's remarkable women's team, which entered this week's NCAA Tournament with a 29-0 record -- the only undefeated team in Division I college basketball.

Whether or not the Huskies go on to win a national championship, they probably have done more in a single season to put women's basketball on the map than any team before them. Playing in the media-rich Northeast, they have gathered about them a movable feast of writers, broadcasters, camera people, all of them eager to tell a special story about a special team. Lately, The New York Times, and even Time magazine, have come to the banquet table.

There are hoop dreams and there are hoop dreams. The polls say the UConn women are the best in the land -- but best cannot begin to say what this team does every time it steps onto a basketball floor. Just before the team's Big East championship game, Coach Geno Auriemma, 41, stood outside the team's locker room and told reporters about his team's strategy for the night.

"The first five times down the floor, we're going to get the ball into Kara," Auriemma said of 6-foot-7 sophomore center Kara Wolters. "If they don't figure out a way to defend her, it'll be 10-0, as simple as that."

And it was. Auriemma was not blowing smoke. Or if he was, he knew what was cooking. The first five times UConn came down the floor, they fed the ball to Wolters. The 10-0 dream, just like that, was 10-0 on the scoreboard.

But the hoop dreams of this team are much more complicated than that. Oh, yes, they have almost always turned their dreams into opponents' nightmares. The closest game all season was a 10-point victory over Kansas in January. There was also an 11-point victory over then topranked Tennessee. Included with twenty-seven other victories were margins exceeding 20, 30, 40 and 50 points.

Why this team is so good is simple. It is big and athletic. Playing up front with Wolters is 6-4 senior Rebecca Lobo, a prolific scorer inside and out, a school record-holder in rebounds and blocked shots, a prolific passer, an all-everything kind of player who was an All-American last season and is expected to be named the nation's top woman player this season. Two other 6-footers, Jarnelle Elliot and Carla Berube see action on the front line as does 6-foot freshman Nykesha Sales, who looks chunky and slow but whose quickness, strength and aggressiveness is vaguely reminiscent of Charles Barkley.

The backcourt is run by junior guard Jen Rizzotti. Rizzotti hyper-extended right elbow in the conference championship victory over Seton Hall, and her full recovery, which is expected, is crucial for postseason because she is the little engine that could. Rizzotti leads the team in assists and steals and is a deadly 3-point shooter, the perfect point guard for a power team.

But whatever fate awaits the Huskies in the next three weeks, they have already made their mark. Because they happen to play under intense media scrutiny, they have become surrogates for women's teams everywhere. Aside from the diehard fans, many people are aware, for example, that Lobo played through her junior season with the knowledge that her mother had contracted cancer (currently in remission). Many know that Sales is one of the next big names in women's basketball. But still, the special character of these women has remained largely unknown.

When she was asked recently why women's basketball was so exciting, Lobo, without a second's hesitation, replied, "I think people appreciate the kind of basketball we play. It's definitely a team game, it's not one on one, well get by you on the first step and dunk the ball. We play below the rim, and so fundamentals are everything. We rely on each other, and I think people appreciate that because they can see themselves out there on the court doing the things we do." People -- the legions of fans and, perhaps, even members of the media -- can identify with them as they cannot with millionaire male superstars.

Says Wolters: "In the state of Connecticut we've become role models. This is an incredible thing. It's an honor to be looked up to and a lot of these kids see us, see what we can do, that we're not wusses, that we play physical and then that we're still women and feminine. It means so much to these kids."

Unspoken in all this is that this game below the rim -- however exciting, however different -- is also a game with a glass ceiling, a game where dreams, even those of the most talented, are all too finite. No professional women's basketball exists in the United States. The game's top stars, such as Lobo, have always had to look elsewhere -- to Europe or to other professions -- after their college careers. That is precisely what makes these days so special for the Huskies and for all other women's teams hoping to shoulder their way to the Final Four April 1-2 in Minneapolis.