900 for Conradt

I think it's a great milestone for a great coach, and would be a great time for her to decide to step away, but I don't think it will happen.

It's a shame the tournament is in OKC this year, because this will be what amounts to a home game for the Land Thieves.  Texas played one of their best games of the season in upsetting OU in Austin, but got taken to the woodshed in Norman.  I expect the same result this time around, unfortunately.

There are a lot of positives in looking at this team heading into next season (quotes from texassports, plus my comments):

• Longhorn redshirt freshman Earnesia Williams (team-high 17 points) was in double-figure scoring for the fifth time in the last six games ... Those 17 points were two shy of her career high... Williams' 7-for-7 effort from the free throw line were career bests in both FT made and FT attempted
• Freshman guard Brittainey Raven finished with 13 points, reaching double-digit scoring for the third game in a row ... Raven is averaging 14.7 pp in this span ... She and Williams will be counted on to provide most of the offense next season, with Tiffany graduating
• Redshirt freshman point guard Carla Cortijo has a DJ-esque assist-turnover ratio in the last four games with 34 assists and just nine turnovers... She had six assists against Missouri, pushing her season total to a team-best 143 ... Cortijo now also has the second-most single season assists by a Longhorn freshman, surpassing Nekeisha Henderson who had 140 assists in 1991-92 ... The freshman record is held by Terri Mackey with 166 assists in 1980-81
• Junior Erneisha Bailey added 13 points for the Longhorns, and had five of Texas' 14 steals.  She is Texas' top defender, and has found her scoring touch this year.  She will be the emotional leader of this team, filling some of the huge hole left by Tiffany's graduation.
• Texas will have Erika Arriaran back from a season-ending ACL injury.  I hope the coaches finally figure out how to use her impressive scoring skills in their offensive playbook next year.
• Texas will get two other players back from injury, sophomore Crystal Boyd (who will likely get a redshirt for this season) and true freshman Kristen Nash (who has also redshirted).  Nash's sister Kathleen joins the team next season.  The Nash sisters are tall, athletic and not afraid of contact, and led Plano West to the state championship last year. BON'ers will love these girls - tall, blond and beautiful.
• The Horns also have another solid post player in next year's class, but her name escapes me.  She's supposed to be a bruiser in the paint, in the Stacey Stephens mode, althought not nearly as big.  We have really lacked - and sorely missed - that kind of power in the years since Stacey graduated.

So there's reason for optimism looking ahead to next year, but I've been optimistic the past three seasons too.  This year, I'm reserving judgement until I see results on the court.

Back to the Big XII tourney - the only way the Longhorns are going to secure themselves an invitation to the NCAA's and a couple of home games in the first two rounds is if they pull another upset of OU.  So here's hoping the team sends Tiffany out with a bang. This will definetly be a season of "what might have been". Texas is 18-13 now, and should be 21-10.  An improbable 3-pointer in the last second in Lubbock, a defensive lapse in the last second against Kansas in Austin, and a total defensive collapse in the last 5 minutes against Nebraska in Austin, all could and should have been Texas victories. You could even throw in the Baylor game in Austin, which was absolutely handed to the Bears by the horrible officiating, but even without that game Texas would have been over the 20-win plateau, and would have definetly earned an NCAA bid.

Coulda woulda shoulda.