HOT SPRINGS — The winner goes to the NCAA Tournament. The loser will have to wait a few days to find out its fate.
The Sun Belt Conference couldn’t have asked for much more for its women’s championship game. UALR (26-5) puts its 21-game winning streak on the line against Middle Tennessee (24-5). Tipoff is at 1 p.m. today at Summit Arena in Hot Springs.
UALR advanced to the championship game with a 73-43 victory over New Orleans. Middle Tennessee responded with a 76-63 victory over Western Kentucky, earning its 15th consecutive victory. Middle Tennessee has won 20 of its past 21 with its only loss coming 63-43 to UALR on Jan. 9.
“You can’t ever tell. It depends what happens across the country, what teams get in, who wins, who does this,” UALR Coach Joe Foley said. “We’ve done all we can do. We’ve won 21 games in a row now. I don’t know how we can do any more.”
Middle Tennessee swept UALR last season, winning by one point in Little Rock and beating UALR 74-54 in the championship of the Sun Belt Tournament. That sent Middle Tennessee to the NCAA Tournament and UALR to the WNIT.
Their first meeting this season was billed as being played for the No. 1 seed in the Sun Belt Tournament. UALR led by 14 points at halftime and built a 24-point lead in the second half before winning by 20.
“I know we’re going to go out with a vengeance because, revenge,” Middle Tennessee guard Anne Marie Lanning said. “They beat us and it left a bad, bad taste in our mouth. We’re going to go out there and play our best and they wanted us, so.”
Both teams will also get a rare chance to showcase their game with ESPNU nationally televising the game.
“We’ve been thinking about that all year,” UALR junior forward Chastity Reed said. “We know when we play them again it will be a lot tougher. We have to get ready mentally and physically to do what we can do to possibly win the game.”
The NCAA Women’s Basketball Committee will begin its deliberations Friday, and both UALR and Middle Tennessee will automatically start on the board by virtue of their regular-season division titles.
Staying there will be the issue as those on the committee start to crunch the numbers and compare teams.
“In UALR and Middle Tennessee, you’re talking about two institutions that won their respective divisions within the Sun Belt and put themselves in great shape at the start of the weekend to be in the discussion,” said Western Kentucky Athletic Director Wood Selig, who is a member of the selection committee.
According to the report released by the NCAA on Monday morning, Middle Tennessee’s Ratings Percentage Index ranking remained at 33 this week and could be in a little better position than UALR, which moved from 58 to 55.
The RPI is a scale used by the committee to rank Division I basketball teams by their performance in light of strength of schedule. Low RPI ranking numbers denote strong teams; and high numbers, weaker ones.
“I think we’re already in,” Middle Tennessee Coach Rick Insell said confidently. “That’s what I think.”
When asked for an endorsement for UALR he wouldn’t give it.
“I can’t answer for them. I’m just answering for Middle Tennessee. We’re already in,” Insell said. “I think we’ve done enough. I don’t really know that much about what Little Rock has done. I think their biggest win was against us, wasn’t it?”
Middle Tennessee’s schedule ranks 94th in the country compared to UALR’s ranking of 178. But it’s not as if Middle Tennessee’s record against the top 100 RPI teams is much better. Middle Tennessee went 5-4 vs. the top 100, with three victories over Western Kentucky and a victory over Louisville, which is 14-17 on the season. Middle Tennessee did beat top 20 RPI team Kentucky at home.
UALR was 2-3 against the top 100, beating Middle Tennessee and Western Kentucky once.
And the loser of today’s game will add another top 100 loss to their resume.
“I’m very confident in our ball club,” Insell said. “And we’ve been all over the country playing anybody that would play us. We’re two games less because we couldn’t get anybody to play us. We’ve done all we can do. I feel real confident about where we’re at right now.”
ESPN’s Charlie Creme, who completes a mock NCAA Tournament bracket each week, agrees. He lists UALR and Middle Tennessee in his latest bracket. But he lists UALR as the automatic bid from the Sun Belt Conference.
“The Trojans still likely need to win the Sun Belt Tournament to get a bid,” Creme wrote on Monday.
Jerry Palm, who runs CollegeRPI.com, also lists UALR as the conference champion in his bracket. He has UALR seeded 13th in the tournament, which would put the Trojans on the bubble, but likely one of the first teams left out.
Creme’s last four teams in the bracket are Michigan, Iowa, Southern California and James Madison. Palm lists Middle Tennessee, North Carolina State, Rutgers and Texas Tech.
Both have James Madison solidly in the field with a 23-6 record and RPI ranking of 41.
James Madison went 5-2 vs. the top 100 RPI teams, but it has lost three times in the past 10 games. That includes a loss to North Carolina-Wilmington, which is 11-18 on the season. But James Madison also has beaten top 100 teams Delaware and Old Dominion during that stretch.
Once the committee starts meeting, Selig can talk about the virtues of UALR or Middle Tennessee if he’s asked about them by other committee members.
“It’s more of a confirmation of data or information more than what my opinions and assessments are,” Selig said.
UALR could also be compared to the likes of Ole Miss and Oklahoma State. UALR led for most of the game in the season opener at Stillwater, Okla., before foul trouble hurt late as the Cowgirls rallied to win 67-58. And UALR lost 70-51 at home to Ole Miss in early December. UALR also lost 62-45 to Nebraska, which is undefeated at 29-0, on a neutral site after leading at halftime.
“The team sheets are a pretty critical form of evaluation too. When you start looking at a bunch of teams together, it has a way of creating separation,” Selig said.
Neither UALR nor Middle Tennessee is getting much attention on the national level. In this week’s Associated Press Top 25, UALR received six votes for 18 points, while Middle Tennessee received four votes for 17 points. Five of the 40 voters are considered national representatives and none of the five listed either team.
“I don’t think in the history of it they’ve left one team out that’s had less than a 40 and I believe that might have been Western Kentucky three years ago,” Insell said. “Who knows?”
Most Sun Belt Conference coaches have stumped for both teams all week. Arkansas State Coach Brian Boyer ended his news conference Sunday with a plug for both teams. New Orleans Coach Amy Champion echoed that on Monday.
“In my mind I really feel this league should be well awarded with two, the conference champion and an at-large,” Champion said. “I think both teams have shown throughout the course of the year, both teams are receiving AP votes. I think they’re two of the most talented teams in the Southeast.”
Sports, Pages 15 on 03/09/2010