USC and Miller Face a Texas-Sized Task : Trojans Play 33-0 Longhorns Today for NCAA Women’s Title

The people who run women’s basketball are tickled pink that No. 1 Texas and No. 3 USC will be playing for the national championship today at Rupp Arena.

The country’s best team against the country’s best player.

Who could have foreseen it? Who will see it? Apparently, precious few in Kentucky. After Texas (33-0) waltzed over Western Kentucky, 90-65, Friday night, all those red-towel-waving Hilltopper fans high-tailed it back to Bowling Green to buy tickets for the Kentucky State Girls’ Championships. They returned about 3,000 of their tickets to the collegiate title game before they left, towels waving in their wake.

Without a local or even regional team in the final, officials are hoping for a crowd of about 7,000 today. Texas has brought a small but loud group of boosters. USC (31-4) has only about 50 boosters here from Los Angeles, but they have set records for party-giving.

A sign in the lobby of the tournament headquarters hotel advertised a meet-the-players party Saturday night. “Admission $3” was crossed out, and “Free” was scrawled over it. Anything to get a crowd.

The game will be televised (Channels 2 and 8 at 10 a.m. PST) right near the start of that big Easter brunch. The pace of the game could make for shaky digestion. USC Coach Linda Sharp advised today’s officials to “wear track shoes,” as the final will showcase the two most proficient running teams in women’s basketball.

“If these two teams play like they are capable of playing, it will be quite a show, I can promise you,” Sharp said.

The women’s game needs a show. Before the emergence of USC’s Cheryl Miller, the women lacked a clear identity.

Tell Jody Conradt about it. The Texas coach is having an identity crisis of her own. At Friday night’s game, Jody was introduced as Judy, and the emcee of an NCAA breakfast on Saturday offered his congratulations to “Texas Coach Pat Conradt.”

Conradt got up Saturday morning to read in a Lexington paper how she was named the College Coach of the Year. True enough, but the paper ran a photograph of Sharp in place of Conradt.

“Right now, I don’t know who I am, but I know what team I coach,” Conradt said.

And what a team it is. The Longhorns have depth to spare, with six seniors and usually 11 players who see action every game. Conradt likes to talk about her seniors, but she’s getting a lot of questions about a certain freshman, Clarissa Davis, who had 32 points, 18 rebounds, 4 steals and 4 blocked shots in 27 minutes against Western Kentucky. Texas is so good that Davis does not start.

“My experience with freshmen is that there are days when they can be very good,” Conradt said. “Clarissa Davis had one of those games Friday night, and I’m very grateful for that. We don’t put much pressure on her. We don’t give her much responsibility game in and game out.”

Davis will be the responsibility of Holly Ford, while Miller will handle Annette Smith, whom Conradt calls the heart of her team. Miller had 31 points and 9 rebounds against Smith when USC lost to Texas, 94-78, Dec. 10 at Austin, Tex., but Smith figured that she did a good job on Miller. As Conradt and other coaches have pointed out, “You don’t stop Cheryl Miller, you contain her.”

Said Smith: “I think Cheryl brings out the best in me, especially on defense.”

USC’s freshman weapon is 6-3 center Cherie Nelson, who made only two baskets and got one rebound in the Texas game. “Cherie was totally intimidated in Texas,” Sharp said.

The Trojans need Nelson to turn the tables and be an intimidator in this one. Nelson will have to help USC work out of its rebounding problem. The Trojans were outrebounded, 48-34, in their 83-59 win over Tennessee Friday night. Texas outrebounded USC, 35-22, in their game Dec. 10.

“I think rebounding may be the key,” Sharp said.

Rebounding and defense. Even though both Texas and USC are seen as offensive teams, each is an effective defensive club.

“We pride ourselves on our defense and we work very hard on it,” Conradt said.

A hard worker on defense for the Longhorns is Andrea Lloyd, a 6-2 forward who is nursing a sore knee but wants to play--and Conradt wants her to play.

“I saw her this morning,” Conradt said Saturday. “I said, ‘Andie, it looks like you are limping.’ She said, ‘No, coach, I’m not.’ That was the extent of my examination today.”

Notes Cheryl Miller said the USC team is tired. “We all got to bed around 2 in the morning,” Miller told reporters Saturday. What she didn’t tell reporters was why the late night. Sharp told this tale: “I was in my room sleeping and (USC publicist) Elise Kim was next door. There was a mouse in her room, and she chased it out--into my room. I saw it and stood on my bed, screaming. I guess another one was in Paula Pyers’ and Kalen Wright’s room. They started screaming. Cheryl came running in to see what was going on. She saw the mouse and nailed it with her shoe from across the room.” . . . Rhonda Windham said she didn’t feel the atmosphere of the Final Four until she was watching the first half of the Texas-Western Kentucky game. “My heart was pounding so hard, my chest began to hurt,” Windham said. . . . When asked if she was bitter that female basketball players have nowhere to go after college, Texas’ Kamie Ethridge said: “No, we are used to it. We grow up with the fact that there is no pro league. We know we aren’t going to be millionaires.” Then Ethridge looked at Miller seated nearby. “At least most of us aren’t going to be millionaires.”