NCAA WOMEN’S TOURNAMENT : Coach: Stanford’s Spark Missing

MISSOULA, Mont. —  In a most improbable NCAA West Regional women’s basketball championship game tonight, Texas Tech will play Colorado, the winner moving on to next weekend’s Final Four in Atlanta.

Texas Tech’s 20-point drubbing of USC in Thursday night’s first semifinal was surprising enough, but Colorado’s 80-67 victory over the Stanford dynasty-in-waiting was still the prime subject of conversation here Friday.

Consider:

--Stanford took a 10-0 lead.

--When Cardinal guard Molly Goodenbour made two three-point shots midway through the second half to give Stanford a 48-40 lead, nearly everyone in the crowd of 6,284 sensed that the Buffaloes were about to be routed. --But it was Stanford, not Colorado, that wilted down the stretch. And the coach of the defending national champions, Tara VanDerveer, tried Friday to explain what happened.

She mentioned “emotional energy” and speculated on why a team with seniors who have two NCAA championship rings, who had been to the Final Four three consecutive seasons, would fold in a regional tournament.

She talked about how a team can win a national title, return with all five starters the next season and be beaten in the round of 16.

“We won it all last year, and I spent the whole preseason telling our players we needed improvement in several areas, and I’m not sure they believed me,” VanDerveer said.

“Coaches can be deceived. You talk to players, you can see them listening to you . . . but sometimes you don’t know if they’re on the same page with you.

“We had the same players back, but this was not the same basketball team. This wasn’t the same chemistry. I don’t want to say success went to their heads, but I can’t think of one occasion right now when we came up with a loose ball this year.

“The same emotional energy just wasn’t there. Crowds can generate emotional energy, but the players have to do it, too.”

While choosing her words carefully, VanDerveer seemed unhappy and disappointed with her team, but she brightened a bit when discussing an incoming group of freshmen, “several” of whom could start.

And Stanford’s loss, she said, was a good sign for women’s college basketball at the Division I level.

“As disappointed as I am, I’m very happy for Colorado,” she said. “They played great defense against us--the longer the game went on, the tougher they played us on defense.

“It seemed we were constantly taking the ball out of bounds. And they went to their post players really well, and I don’t think they took any bad shots.”

Tonight, Colorado’s scrambling defense will concentrate on Texas Tech’s Sheryl Swoopes, who scored 33 points during the victory over USC.

Friday, a reporter asked Colorado Coach Ceal Barry which of her defenders would match up well with the 6-foot Swoopes.

“You’re talking about a player who can get 55 or 60 points almost any night she wants,” Barry said. “ No one matches up with Sheryl Swoopes.”