No. 3 Duke Beats No. 9 Penn State

Alana Beard scored 21 points to lead a crop of freshmen who provided the bulk of the scoring as No. 3 Duke beat No. 9 Penn State, 88-87, Monday night at State College, Pa.

Lisa Shepherd banked in a three-pointer with 6.2 seconds left to bring the Lady Lions within a point. Duke’s Rometra Craig, also a freshman, was fouled and missed both free throws. But she rebounded her own miss and held the ball as time expired.

Duke got 53 points from four freshmen, including Beard, Iciss Tillis (16 points), Craig (12) and Chrystal White (four).

No. 11 Louisiana Tech 68, No. 4 Purdue 63--Ayana Walker scored 24 points at West Lafayette, Ind., as Louisiana Tech became the first team to win the preseason women’s NIT twice.

No. 5 Notre Dame 95, Arizona 65--Alicia Ratay had 26 points at South Bend, Ind., as Notre Dame won its 24th consecutive home game.

Ruth Riley added 17 points, seven rebounds and four blocked shots for Notre Dame.

No. 13 Texas Tech 78, Texas Arlington 40--Dionne Brown scored 15 points to lead five players in double figures for Texas Tech at Lubbock, Texas.

Texas 56, No. 16 Virginia 55--Texas scored four of the first five points in double overtime in a preseason women’s NIT consolation game.

No. 18 Stanford 85, Santa Clara 57--Lauren St. Clair scored 13 points and Enjoli Izidor added 12 for the Cardinal at Stanford.

No. 20 Auburn 75, Southern 60--Center Lori Nero had 14 points and 13 rebounds to lead Auburn at Auburn, Ala.

TONIGHT

Pepperdine has a troublesome assignment tonight at Firestone Fieldhouse.

The Waves (2-1) play the University of Connecticut (1-0), already being called by some the greatest women’s NCAA team ever.

That’s right, better than the 1995 UConn team that went 35-0 and better than that 39-0 Tennessee team of 1998.

The defending national champions have their first eight scorers back from their 36-1 team of last season, the one that buried Tennessee in the NCAA championship game, 71-52. So UConn was a consensus preseason favorite to repeat.

But few were prepared for what Geno Auriemma’s Huskies did on Nov. 12.

Playing before 16,294 at the Hartford Civic Center, UConn beat Georgia, a team ranked third in several preseason polls, 99-70. Moreover, UConn had a 29-point lead in the first half.

UConn, by the numbers:

* The Huskies finished last season with a 17-game winning streak and won all six of their NCAA tournament games by at least 15 points.

* In its rout of Georgia, UConn shot 61.8% in the first half and held Georgia to 31.3%.

* Seniors Shea Ralph, Svetlana Abrosimova and Kelly Schumacher all are projected as WNBA first-round draft picks next April.

* The same is forecast in 2002 for juniors Sue Bird and Swin Cash.