Times wires
Monday, April 4, 2011
INDIANAPOLIS — Already packed with one surprise after another, the NCAA Tournament has one big dose of intrigue left when Notre Dame and Texas A&M play for the championship tonight.
It's the second title game without a No. 1 seed. But there's a budding star in Irish point guard Skylar Diggins, a new participant in the Aggies and an entertaining, outspoken coach in Texas A&M's Gary Blair.
"It's good to see two new faces in the Final Four championship game," Blair said. "For our sport to grow, we need Texas A&M and Notre Dame in this game."
The schools better known for football are No. 2 seeds, but few expected this matchup.
"Somebody said only one person predicted that it was going to be an A&M-Notre Dame matchup out of all the millions of people who do a bracket," Texas A&M guard Sydney Colson said. "It will get some of those top-name girls to branch out to other schools and realize it's not just UConn and Stanford and Tennessee that can win national championships."
Diggins was one of those girls. She grew up in South Bend and cheered the Irish on as they won the national title in 2001.
"I was there, hands on the TV," she said. "If they lost, I'd have been crushed."
Now the sophomore guard has led the Irish to back-to-back victories over Tennessee and Connecticut, the first time a team has beaten those two in the same NCAA Tournament. It's only happened eight times during the same regular season.
"It's awesome," Diggins said. "And we're not done yet."
With 28 points against Connecticut, Diggins has become an overnight national sensation. She gained nearly 20,000 Twitter followers after Sunday's victory.
It helped to get a tweet shoutout from rapper Lil Wayne, who has 1.6 million followers.
"It's crazy," she said. "I just have fun on Twitter. I have a lot of young girls following me and asking how I handle different situations. I have to understand that I'm a mentor and a role model and act as such."
Texas A&M bullied its way through the tournament. It vanquished its conference rival, beating Baylor in the region final after losing to the Bears three times during the season.
Texas A&M has a relentless defense that didn't allow more than 50 points until Stanford scored 62 in the semifinals.
Offensively, the Aggies rely on Danielle Adams, the first All-American in school history. Their defense is fueled by harassing guards Colson and Sydney Carter.
"A lot of people, I don't want to say they fear our defense, but I think they really respect what we do on the defensive end," Carter said. "And we take so much pride on the defensive end and making people feel uncomfortable and making them do things that they don't want to do."
Added Colson: "It's going to be a physical game; I think they're just as physical as we are. And I think it's just going to be an all-out battle."