By Wendell Barnhouse | wendell@big12sports.com
Big 12 Sports.com CorrespondentVan Chancellor, a Hall of Famer and a veteran women's coach who has stalked sidelines in the Southeastern Conference and WNBA, can be sworn in as an expert witness. Here is the LSU coach's testimony regarding Nebraska's undefeated team.
"I'm going to tell you, they're a top-10, top-12 team," he said after his fifth-ranked team lost to the Cornhuskers, 77-63, Sunday in Lincoln. "Their half-court defense was outstanding, and Griffin looked like an All-American. Nebraska's for real. The Big 12 better look out."
Nebraska's victory over the Tigers made the Cornhuskers 11-0. In this week's Associated Press Top 25, they're No. 14. Coach Connie Yori's team is the only undefeated team in the Big 12.
"This win says a lot about us as individuals and how tough we're going to play on any given night, no matter who our opponent is," Nebraska senior forward Cory Montgomery told the Lincoln Journal-Star. "I wouldn't say we had to prove it to ourselves (that we could win). We know we're a good team."
Senior forward Kelsey Griffin, who had to sit out last season due to injury, has returned to play at a high level. She's averaging 17.9 points and 9.9 rebounds per game while making 61 percent of her shots.
When Yori took over the program in 2002, she didn't have the depth needed to play her preferred full-court defensive pressure. This season, the Cornhuskers have a deep and talented roster.
"It's a rarity to play full-court man-to-man defense, and continue the pressure throughout the possession," Yori said. "In order to do it, you have to have depth. You need to be at least two-deep at every position. On top of that, you have to have kids who have the mind-set of, 'We have to work hard.' It's hard to play that style. It's wearing. It fatigues you. But it also fatigues the other team. That's the idea."
A crowd of 7,717 for the LSU game set a Devaney Sports Center record for a nonconference women's game.
"We feel we're at the point in our program that people should come out and watch us because we're kind of fun to watch," Yori said.
Fun to watch but not much to play against.
Riley sets Oklahoma State scoring record
Oklahoma State senior guard Andrea Riley became the school's career scoring leader when she scored 28 points Tuesday night in the Cowgirls' 90-65 victory over Oral Roberts.
Riley's two free throws with 13:56 gave her the points she needed to break Clinette Jordan's school record of 2,168 points. Riley has scored 2,192 points, the fifth-most in Big 12 history.
Last Saturday, Riley needed 25 points against Mercer to set the Cowgirls' career scoring record. She finished with 20 points but her 17 assists tied the Big 12 single-game record held by former Texas Tech guard Melinda Schmucker. Her 17 assists also broke the Oklahoma State single-game record of 13 set by Brisa Silva in 2005.
Dealing with a distraction
Missouri is 8-2 but most of the attention the Tigers received recently was far from positive. The team made national news and was the buzz on web sites after its two starting forwards were suspended after a physical altercation with a male cheerleader.
Leading scorers Amanda Hanneman and Jessra Johnson were suspended until an investigation revealed they were not at fault and the cheerleader declined to press charges. They have been reinstated.
"Obviously, I don't like the perception" the dispute "gave off because I don't think it's a true representation of us," Stein told the Columbia Daily Tribune, "but as I told our kids, we've got to prove it otherwise. … The next phase for us is to make a great story out of this."
While Hanneman and Johnson were suspended, 6-3 sophomore Christine Flores continued her emergence. In her first career start at Mizzou Arena, Flores had a game-high 16 points, 12 rebounds and matched a single-game school-record with seven blocks in the Tigers' 71-32 win over Murray State.
Layups
* Four days after recording the first triple double in school history, Baylor freshman Brittney Griner almost recorded a second triple double. Last Sunday against 14th-ranked Arizona State, the 6-8 Griner had 27 points, 10 rebounds and eight blocks in the Lady Bears' 70-66 victory. "You already have to put her in the company of some of the other greats like Candace Parker and Maya Moore," Arizona State coach Charli Turner Thorne said. "She's come so far from high school so quickly."
* Kansas senior Danielle McCray had a season-high 30 points in the Jayhawks' 75-60 victory over California-Riverside Sunday night. Coach Bonnie Henrickson thought that other than McCray, her team played a sloppy game. "She ought to be a little weary because she carried 14 other guys with her tonight," Henrickson said of McCray. "She was dialed in and great. That's what All-Americans do."
* Because of final exams, a loss to Colorado State in the previous outing and her recruiting trip to Europe, Colorado coach Kathy McConnell-Miller was concerned how her team would perform against Southern Utah last Saturday. The Buffaloes erased any concerns quickly by building leads of 24-0 and 40-2 on the way to an 88-36 rout of the Thunderbirds. Asked what she got out of the victory, CU's Brittany Spears said: "Just practice. Whether it`s practicing our offense or getting in conditioning or learning your position. It was practicing in the game."
* Credit Jerry Hill of the Baylor Insider blog for pointing this out: Baylor is one of six Division I programs with a combined 20 victories for its men's and women's programs. Kentucky's men and women are 22-0 followed by Ohio State (21-3), Florida State (21-3), Syracuse (20-0), Baylor (20-2) and St. John's (20-2).
* Ratings Percentage Index rankings produced by College Basketball News and Jeff Sagarin have the Big 12 listed as the No. 1 conference. The RPI rankings have been produced three weeks so far and the Big 12 has been on top each time.
* The Big 12 has six teams ranked in this week's Associated Press Top 25 - 5, Baylor; 10, Texas A&M; 13, Oklahoma; 14, Nebraska; 17, Texas; 21, Kansas. No conference has that many teams in the Top 25.
