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Mechelle VoepelESPN.com
When Adia Barnes became the head coach for women’s basketball in Arizona in 2016, everyone she knew seemed to think it was a mistake, even if it was her alma mater.
“When I took over, it was a bad job,” Barnes said. “Everyone said, ‘Don’t take it.’ All my mentors, friends who are legends in the game … said it was a bad job, you can’t win, it’s hard to recruit there. “
However, Barnes’ No. 3 savage is heading to the NCAA Women’s Elite Eita, and on Monday they will face another team that is in a regional final for the first time in the program’s history: No. 4, Indiana.
Mercado Regional saw its first two seeds, NC State and Texas A&M, descend on Saturday in Indiana and Arizona, two schools with men’s basketball history, as national champions. And now they are making their own history from women.
“The state of Indiana is basketball,” said Hoosiers coach Teri Moren, an Indiana native who played collegiate at Purdue. “Tradition has always been on the side of men. We wanted to build our own.”
Indiana (2018) and Arizona (2019) have taken steps in this direction by winning WNIT titles in the last two years. These championships provided both programs with the post-season success needed to learn.
It is the first time since 1997, when Notre Dame faced George Washington, that two Elite Eighters meet in a regional final. The Irish won that match and then lost in the national semifinals. But Notre Dame has since won NCAA titles in 2001 and 2018 and has become a national powerhouse.
Hoosiers keeper Ali Patberg, originally from Indiana, began her college career at Notre Dame in 2015. But she suffered an ACL injury that ended what would have been her freshman season before it began. After playing next season at Notre Dame, Patberg said her confidence dropped and she transferred.
“It was broken when it got to Indiana,” Moren said. “But as long as she had someone who was willing to work out and be in the gym with her and love her and laugh with her, I looked at her in a way blossoming in front of us, at the child that I watched him in high school and he played so fearlessly. “
Patberg led the Hoosiers by 17 points on Saturday in their 73-70 victory over NC State.
“My journey was very different,” Patberg said. “But, you know, it was perfect. I had a lot of hard battles at first. But I came to Indiana where they believed in me.”
Arizona made a previous Sweet 16: in Barnes’ senior year, 1998, when he lost in the regional semifinals to UConn. She was the Pac-10 player of the year and played in the WNBA from 1998-2004, winning a championship with Seattle her last season in the league. He also played abroad before becoming a coach. She was an assistant in Washington in 2016, when the Huskies ran in their first women’s finals, and shortly after Barnes left for Arizona.
Her first season, 2016-17, was tough as the Wildcats went 14-16. It was harder in 2017-18, when they went 6-24. But on the bench that season was goalkeeper Aari McDonald, who had come from Washington – where he was the 2017 Pac-12 freshman – and was preparing for his transfer season.
With McDonald in the group for the past three years, the Wildcats have gone 24-13 (winning a WNIT title), 24-7 and now 19-5 and a victory away from the Final Four.
On Saturday, McDonald’s Pac-12 player had one of the best games of her career at the perfect time for the Wildcats: 31 points and five rebounds in a 71-59 victory over Texas A&M. Defending, she helped Aggies keep goalkeeper Jordan Nixon three points behind after Nixon scored 35 in the second round.
“I knew what the transfer to Arizona would be like,” McDonald said. “I had to take everything with a grain of salt, I have to be positive knowing that I’m out. I knew I had to improve, to make my colleagues better.
“What a feeling. I’m just dumb. It’s crazy. It’s thrilling. It was amazing. It was a wonderful walk. It’s not over yet.”