WVU vs. New Mexico Preview

 

The WVU ladies, a #5 seed in the famed Spokane regional of the NCAA women’s tournament. After a third-place Big East finish and a 24-7 record, WVU gets to try to continue the school’s dominance over the desert southwest by facing New Mexico. I don’t know if the 5-12 matchup is as dreaded in women’s basketball as it is in men’s, but it certainly doesn’t help that WVU will be playing in…Albuquerque. In the home gymnasium of New Mexico. How does that happen? In the men’s tournament, no team can play where it hosts it home games. Why is it allowed in the women’s tournament? There goes the dream of the women’s tournament being equal with the men’s. The NCAA screams for equality and shoves Title IX down everybody’s throats, but then comes the time to make a bracket and they pull over a screw job like this. Congratulations, you saved New Mexico a little bit on travel costs. You’re also making WVU fly across the country on two consecutive weekends, assuming they can get past New Mexico and the winner of Vanderbilt-Montana.

I’m not going to break down the game here, I know absolutely nothing about New Mexico’s team. But this is Yinka Sanni’s time to shine on a national stage, she needs to play like the unstoppable force she has seemed to be at times this season. I doubt the Lobos can throw anything at these seven seniors that they haven’t seen before.

For some more reading, here’s the quintessential Mickey Furfari piece and a much better piece by the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review’s Kevin Gorman. I realize they may have more resources available, but it is truly sad how much better the Pittsburgh fish wrappers cover WVU at times than the state newspapers.

Meanwhile, here are 1/2/3/4/5/6/7 articles from this week’s ABQ Journal. It appears people actually care about women’s basketball in the Land of Enchantment, which is probably why they are hosting a regional as a 12-seed while WVU travels across the country.

Tonight’s game will tip-off just after 8 p.m. Eastern with ESPN2 providing the television coverage.

Tags: NCAA tournament, New Mexico, Olayinka Sanni, Title IX, womens basketball