Colorado University Athletics
Brooks: Huskers Cloud Big 12 Coaches' Crystal Ball
January 29, 2010 | Women's Basketball, B.G. Brooks
At best, Big 12 Conference coaches were lukewarm toward Yori's eighth Nebraska team. In their preseason rankings, the league's pollsters gave the Cornhuskers a nice figurative pat on the head and said, "How does the middle of the pack sound? Here's sixth place . . . we'll get back to you later."
Yori and her team - arguably this season's biggest surprise - haven't settled for sixth. How does 18-0 and a Top 10 ranking (No. 4 ESPN/USA Today, No. 6 AP) sound?
To Yori, it sounds like some Big 12 coaches might request a dash of salt and pepper as they dine on their prediction.
At the Big 12's preseason media briefing, Yori fielded a question about the Huskers possibly being a "sleeper" in 2009-10.
Her response: "We were definitely a sleeper last year - at least we put our fans to sleep with how bad we were on offense."
Minus the slapstick, Yori continued: "I'm really, really excited about our team . . . I went home last night, and my husband of 14 years -- and we've been together for 16 years -- asked me, 'Hey, how did practice go?' I said, 'It went great.' We've had now six practices, and every night I've gone home, and every night my husband's asked me that, and every night I've said, 'It's gone great.'
"He said, 'What is wrong with you? You are never this positive.' And I said, 'Well, you know,honey, I'm a realist. I'm not an optimist. I'm not a pessimist, but I'm a realist. I'm real excited about our team. I think we have some things in place that we haven't always had.'
"Like everybody, you've got to get healthy and stay healthy. But we have a lot of the components there that we could have a great season."
Eighteen games in, who's addled enough to argue? The Cornhuskers, who visit the Coors Events Center Saturday (3:30 p.m., FSN Rocky Mountain), are in the midst of a school-record winning streak and are looking for their first 6-0 conference start in school history.
Saying they're on a bona fide roll is a bit like saying Toyota has hit a rough patch. On Wednesday night in Lubbock, Texas - an inhospitable haunt where Nebraska hadn't won in seven previous trips - the Cornhuskers obliterated Texas Tech, 89-47. It was the largest margin of victory ever for a conference road win in Nebraska women's hoops.
Yori's team is 7-0 on the road this season and already has beaten two of the teams ranked above it by the league's coaches - preseason favorite Baylor, 65-56, and Texas, 91-79.
It's fairly easy to pinpoint several reasons for Nebraska's success, but all lists start with experience, chemistry and the return of forward Kelsey Griffin, a fifth-year senior from Eagle River, Alaska, who redshirted in 2008-09 following an ankle injury that required two surgeries.
"Kelsey Griffin is very, very talented . . . very good at what she does," CU coach Kathy McConnell-Miller said. "She makes them very difficult to guard."
Aside from the 6-foot-2 Griffin, who averages 19.1 points and 10.4 rebounds (she's been the leading scorer in 10 games, the leading rebounder in 15), Yori starts two other seniors, a junior and a freshman point guard.
The freshman - Lindsey Moore - is surrounded by enough experience that adjusting to hoops at her new level hasn't overwhelmed her.
"She's a legit point guard," McConnell-Miller said. "That allows (Yvonne) Turner and Dominique (Kelley) to play their natural positions , to be scorers and playmakers."
The Buffs defeated the Griffin-less Huskers, 75-73, on the last day of January last season in Boulder. CU owns a 25-5 in the Events Center, but if there is a win No. 26, it will rival any of the preceding 'W's.
"We have a great team coming in here; it would be a big win for us," CU senior guard Bianca Smith said.
The Buffs have lost three of their last four and are 2-4 in conference play (12-7 overall). Inconsistency - much of it due to the league's brutal degree of difficulty - has plagued CU in January. A disappointing, costly half was followed by a "very good one" in Wednesday night's loss (75-64) at Kansas.
"I would say there are portions of games where we need to be performing at a higher level," McConnell-Miller said. "Those are the opportunities where teams attack us and take the game over."
Her players, though, are "understanding it," she said. "Now they need to stop talking about it and just get out there and play."
That's precisely what Nebraska has done - a defining quality Smith acknowledges: "They just execute; even when things are down, you can tell they're still composed and are going to comeback. We have to combat that mental toughness with our mental toughness for 40 minutes."
If that happens Saturday, CU can keep itself afloat. It's the time of the season when McConnell-Miller knows that eye-catching wins start becoming necessities for what might transpire in March.
Barring a breakdown, that isn't Nebraska's concern. Flashing back to October in Kansas City, site of the Big 12's postseason tournament in mid-March, Yori was emboldened enough to speak of making "a push for a conference championship . . . and I've never even used those words in this setting."
As January slips away, the Huskers are making her appear prophetic - and the rest of the league's coaches shortsighted.
Contact: BG.Brooks@Colorado.EDU
