KANSAS CITY, Mo.—In the first nine years of the Big 12, the Texas A&M women won a total of 26 conference basketball games and never finished higher than ninth.
In the past two years, the Aggies have won 24 Big 12 games, including a 13-3 record last season to tie Oklahoma for first. They return all five starters, 10 of 12 lettermen and are predicted to win the conference crown this season.
“Can we live up to all the hype and expectations?” Texas A&M coach Gary Blair said Tuesday at the Big 12 women’s basketball media day. “That is what we’re coaching for. I’m tired of being Cinderella. I’m the oldest Cinderella there is, and so we’ll relish it at the top. Now what we’ve got to do is try to live up to it. We will not be the sleeper that’s coming up.”
Said Oklahoma State coach Kurt Budke: “Gary has done an unbelievable job. He’s very deserving to be picked No. 1 in the conference. With all that talent he has back, he should probably win the national championship.”
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SWEARING OFF LAST PLACE: Missouri coach Cindy Stein did not have the proper words when the Big 12 coaches picked her Tigers last in the preseason poll.
“I used to have a really bad swearing habit,” Stein said. “And so my players tease me now because I say jiminy, holy smokes and geez, just to keep myself from saying something else. None of those words came out of my mouth (when the poll came out). I probably reverted back a little bit.”
The Tigers return just one starter from a team that went 5-11 and finished 10th in the Big 12 last season.
“I had to gather myself, because I understand why, but I don’t like it,” Stein said. “Maybe people think I’m sour grapes because we got picked 12th this year, but those people that know me know that I would say that if I was picked fifth on. I want to be the No. 1 pick, and that’s what we’re striving for.”
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BAYLOR’S NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP HELPS: The Big 12 men have never produced a national basketball championship, but the women have—in 2005.
“I think when Baylor did that, it totally changed our league forever,” Iowa State coach Bill Fennelly said. “We’ve had All-American players. We’ve had a litany of Hall of Fame coaches. There’s nothing we don’t have, except for that. When Baylor did it, it’s like, ‘OK, we can get that out of the way and move on.'”
Senior guard Angle Tisdale is the only Lady Bear remaining from that national title team.
“I remember cutting down the nets, going crazy in the locker room after the game and the big parade when we came back,” Tisdale said. “I think everybody in town came out. It was so fun.”
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NOT THE USUAL FRESHMAN: Krysten Boogaard, a 6-foot-5 freshman from Canada, is the tallest Kansas player and comes from an athletic family.
“She played internationally with the Canadian National Team in the summer and was not on campus in June and July, which would have helped us,” Kansas coach Bonnie Henrickson said. “She’s long. She’s lanky. She’s in the middle of the pack when we run sprints. She’s a physical kid. She has two brothers that play in the NHL and one that’s a fighter, so she knows how to throw the elbows around a little bit.”
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PLEASE, ANYBODY BUT DUKE: After coaching at Duke the past 15 years, coach Gale Goestenkors has replaced Jody Conradt at Texas. What would Goestenkors’ reaction be if she had to meet Duke in the NCAA tournament?
“I wouldn’t feel good at all,” she said. “We were actually scheduled to play Duke this year and I took it off the schedule. I felt it would just be too hard for everybody involved. There are a lot of emotions there. I still feel very close and always will with the team at Duke, so I didn’t want to put any of us through that.”
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LIFE WITHOUT GIPSON: Kansas State started 14-2 last season with Marlies Gipson averaging 12.8 points and 8.3 rebounds when she suffered a season-ending knee injury against Missouri. The Wildcats lost 12 of their next 14 games and finished in a last-place tie in the Big 12 without her.
“I don’t think it was solely the loss of just the production she brings to the floor,” Kansas State coach Deb Patterson said. “I think it was just the change in dynamics of how we looked to play, getting the chemistry where we wanted it on the floor, night and night out, taking a little bit of pressure off our perimeter players at the time. I think it was just sort of a ripple effect in a lot of aspects.”
Gipson was released on Aug. 18 to resume working out.
