Women’s Final Four

This year’s women’s national semifinalists are no strangers to the final weekend, having made a combined 22 trips to the NCAA Final Four

Throw it down

Sylvia Fowles, Louisiana State’s All-American center, brought a small crowd to its feet Saturday in the Quicken Loans Arena when she dunked during practice on the eve of tonight’s NCAA basketball semifinals.

But the 6-foot-6 junior from Miami has never dunked in a game.

“I really don’t worry about it as much as some people think I should,” said Fowles, who has averaged 17.2 points, 12.7 rebounds and 2.1 blocks in leading LSU to its fourth consecutive Final Four. “I just worry about doing what I have to do to help my teammates out. If an opportunity for me to dunk comes, if I get one, I’m pretty sure I’ll knock it down, but that’s not my main focus right now.”

Good and bad

For any other program, it would be a run of success worthy of trumpeting:

* 1999: Sweet 16.

* 2000: Final Four.

* 2001: Sweet 16.

* 2002: Final Four.

* 2003: Final Four.

* 2004: Final Four.

* 2005: Final Four.

* 2006: Sweet 16.

* 2007: Final Four.

For Tennessee, it’s a drought. The Lady Vols, six-time NCAA champions, have not won a title since 1998, when they won their third in a row. They lost to Connecticut in the championship game in 2000, 2003 and 2004.

College is fun

Tennessee sophomore Candace Parker, named Saturday as the Wade Trophy winner as national player of the year, has downplayed speculation that she might leave school early to make herself available for the WNBA draft.

Her coach, Pat Summitt, hasn’t lost any sleep over it.

“I think there’s only one choice,” Summitt said. “I think Candace right now is on the biggest stage in women’s basketball, and she understands that....

“I think she understands that it’s not as if she’s turning down millions of dollars. I wish we could get to that point in our pro game ... but I certainly think she understands that the college game right now is the place that she’s really excelling and getting a lot of recognition and having a lot of fun.”

Scarlet nots

When Rutgers struggled at the start of the season, losing four of its first six games, Coach C. Vivian Stringer stopped wearing red and black -- the school’s colors -- and also stripped her players of their school-issued gear.

“That was just her way of saying that we weren’t living up to the Scarlet Knights’ tradition,” junior Essence Carson said. “We weren’t the warriors that she was used to coaching. And she said she wouldn’t give us our stuff back and she wouldn’t wear school colors until we proved that we could play as a team and let go of individuality and come together.”

Now that they’re in the Final Four, “we have our sweat suits back,” Carson noted.

That’s so 2006

Tennessee and North Carolina, who meet in tonight’s second semifinal, played last year in the same arena, in a regional final, with North Carolina winning.

Tennessee players said they felt a feeling of deja vu.

And you, Erlana Larkins?

“Not really,” the North Carolina junior said. “I didn’t even notice. We know we played Tennessee last year in the regional finals in the same gym, but I would have never thought, ‘Same locker room,’ and things like that. That was last year, and we can’t really focus on that. It’s about this year and doing what we have to do to win.”

Rock solid

Summitt, Stringer and North Carolina’s Sylvia Hatchell are the three winningest active coaches in women’s basketball, but only LSU’s interim coach, Bob Starkey, is unbeaten. The Tigers are 4-0 since he took over last month.

“When you’re in junior high, you have one of those aptitude tests and there are four pictures -- there’s the apple, the orange, the banana and the rock -- and you have to check off the one that doesn’t fit,” Starkey said. “I would be the rock.”

--JERRY CROWE