[Blue Hawk (Mizzou) Card]

Not sure this post is worth a new thread, but I thought we should start a new one as the theme now should be "We are Taking Our Twins (and All the Others) to the Final Four!"

We are so excited that our team made the Final Four. Since moving back to North Dakota, we no longer have many driving road trips to see our beloved Cardinal, so our crew is fired up for this one.

Random thoughts that I was not able to post until now:

1. STANFORD HAS THE TOUGHEST ROAD TO A POSSIBLE TITLE: You don't get any bonus points for this and it is a matter of luck more than anything, but Stanford has/had the toughest possible road to a national title of the remaining teams. There were no major upsets that got Stanford a game against a significantly weaker team, athletically.

I don't like Texas's style of play one bit. In fact, I don't like that university one bit (but that is a family story related to my Dad's time there, so its irrelevant here). But they are really good at what they do. Likewise, Maryland is really good at what they do. [For a half, even Kansas, another school I don't like, was decent.] And all of the possible opponents from this point forward play really good defense. You don't demolish teams like the ones Stanford has been playing. So it is tough on the nerves of fans, but you have to give our team credit for, so far, overcoming some very good teams.

2. FINALLY FIGURED OUT LEXIE: Have you ever had the experience of interacting with someone, thinking "s/he reminds me of someone, but I cannot think of who?" That is what I have thought of Lexie for four years. For some reason, I finally figured out who last night: Chris Hernandez. Like Lexie, that guy would do anything (legal) to get Stanford a win. Lexie slides all over the floor, grabs tough rebounds, drives into much larger players, hits clutch threes, etc., etc., etc. Her assist to Cam on the "and one" was as pretty a pass as you will ever see (with credit to Cam to know to go to the hoop, also). I am really going to miss her. But as they say, "Don't be sad that it's over. Be glad that it happened." What an honor it is to root for her (and her teammates, of course).

Right now, Lexie Hull is the MVP of the tournament. Even if she keeps it up, she will never be recognized as such, and it is pretty clear that the Stanford team does not care about individual honors. But she puts her team on her back over and over.

3. LACIE TO THE RESCUE: Since my theme is twins to the Twin Cities, let's note, as the great Bob K has, that Lacie is going to be one of four starting point guards in the Final Four next weekend. Over her career at Stanford, she has been asked to do a variety of things, and she has done them. One big difference between the first Texas game and the one yesterday is the improved guard play. A substantial part of that was Haley, whom I also love. But Lacie has improved a lot in her point guard role over the course of the season.

4. FRAN FAN: Now it's confession time. After her second half of the season last year, I assumed Fran would never again be a significant contributor. Everyone loves a redemption story, and Fran is the best redemption story of the year for us. She was the key beta (i.e., unexpected key factor) last night. My wife will report that, time after time last night when Fran got the ball at the end of the free throw line (the corner of the lane), I said "Don't give her the ball there! Something bad is about to happen." Over and over, it didn't. By the second half, my wife was responding, "That must be the strategy." She was right.

5. IN TARA WE TRUST: Or, at least, I do. Not that she needs me to defend her, but a fellow poster has been pretty tough on her, so here is my take: With significant assistance from Kate Paye (and others, no doubt), nobody is better at putting her team in a position to win than Tara. Sometimes the strategy is non-obvious and even frustrating to us as fans. [As Maryland inched closer, it was aggravating. But Tara had done the math, and she obviously told her team that priority no. one was to run clock. That led to some ugly possessions, because it can be difficult to find a good shot in the last five seconds of the clock. But it was the right strategy. And it worked. If Stanford had played the fourth quarter the way it played the last two minutes of the third quarter, the game might have been long enough for Maryland to win it.]

Against Texas, the strategy was to accept a beating from the guards, but to clog the middle. Again, at times that was tough to observe as a fan, like when no. 31 got hot from three-point range. But it worked. Those threes that went down so often in the first three quarters did not go down in the fourth.

Last night in the second quarter, the back door cut that is a staple of Stanford's offense worked wonderfully. But Tara knew Texas would cut that off in the second half, so she used other offensive strategies. She makes great halftime adjustments.

I've been a sports fan for about six decades. I've rooted for lots of teams, with lots of coaches. Tara is the best coach of any of those teams. In other words, she is my favorite coach of all time. I have more faith in her ability to give our team its best chance of winning than I've had in those dozens (hundreds, maybe) of other coaches.

Though we don't know when it will happen, someday relatively soon we will no longer have the chance to root for Tara's teams. Let's enjoy what we have left of a wonderful ride.

[Blue Hawk (Mizzou) Card]

Not sure this post is worth a new thread, but I thought we should start a new one as the theme now should be "We are Taking Our Twins (and All the Others) to the Final Four!"

We are so excited that our team made the Final Four. Since moving back to North Dakota, we no longer have many driving road trips to see our beloved Cardinal, so our crew is fired up for this one.

Random thoughts that I was not able to post until now:

1. STANFORD HAS THE TOUGHEST ROAD TO A POSSIBLE TITLE: You don't get any bonus points for this and it is a matter of luck more than anything, but Stanford has/had the toughest possible road to a national title of the remaining teams. There were no major upsets that got Stanford a game against a significantly weaker team, athletically.

I don't like Texas's style of play one bit. In fact, I don't like that university one bit (but that is a family story related to my Dad's time there, so its irrelevant here). But they are really good at what they do. Likewise, Maryland is really good at what they do. [For a half, even Kansas, another school I don't like, was decent.] And all of the possible opponents from this point forward play really good defense. You don't demolish teams like the ones Stanford has been playing. So it is tough on the nerves of fans, but you have to give our team credit for, so far, overcoming some very good teams.

2. FINALLY FIGURED OUT LEXIE: Have you ever had the experience of interacting with someone, thinking "s/he reminds me of someone, but I cannot think of who?" That is what I have thought of Lexie for four years. For some reason, I finally figured out who last night: Chris Hernandez. Like Lexie, that guy would do anything (legal) to get Stanford a win. Lexie slides all over the floor, grabs tough rebounds, drives into much larger players, hits clutch threes, etc., etc., etc. Her assist to Cam on the "and one" was as pretty a pass as you will ever see (with credit to Cam to know to go to the hoop, also). I am really going to miss her. But as they say, "Don't be sad that it's over. Be glad that it happened." What an honor it is to root for her (and her teammates, of course).

Right now, Lexie Hull is the MVP of the tournament. Even if she keeps it up, she will never be recognized as such, and it is pretty clear that the Stanford team does not care about individual honors. But she puts her team on her back over and over.

3. LACIE TO THE RESCUE: Since my theme is twins to the Twin Cities, let's note, as the great Bob K has, that Lacie is going to be one of four starting point guards in the Final Four next weekend. Over her career at Stanford, she has been asked to do a variety of things, and she has done them. One big difference between the first Texas game and the one yesterday is the improved guard play. A substantial part of that was Haley, whom I also love. But Lacie has improved a lot in her point guard role over the course of the season.

4. FRAN FAN: Now it's confession time. After her second half of the season last year, I assumed Fran would never again be a significant contributor. Everyone loves a redemption story, and Fran is the best redemption story of the year for us. She was the key beta (i.e., unexpected key factor) last night. My wife will report that, time after time last night when Fran got the ball at the end of the free throw line (the corner of the lane), I said "Don't give her the ball there! Something bad is about to happen." Over and over, it didn't. By the second half, my wife was responding, "That must be the strategy." She was right.

5. IN TARA WE TRUST: Or, at least, I do. Not that she needs me to defend her, but a fellow poster has been pretty tough on her, so here is my take: With significant assistance from Kate Paye (and others, no doubt), nobody is better at putting her team in a position to win than Tara. Sometimes the strategy is non-obvious and even frustrating to us as fans. [As Maryland inched closer, it was aggravating. But Tara had done the math, and she obviously told her team that priority no. one was to run clock. That led to some ugly possessions, because it can be difficult to find a good shot in the last five seconds of the clock. But it was the right strategy. And it worked. If Stanford had played the fourth quarter the way it played the last two minutes of the third quarter, the game might have been long enough for Maryland to win it.]

Against Texas, the strategy was to accept a beating from the guards, but to clog the middle. Again, at times that was tough to observe as a fan, like when no. 31 got hot from three-point range. But it worked. Those threes that went down so often in the first three quarters did not go down in the fourth.

Last night in the second quarter, the back door cut that is a staple of Stanford's offense worked wonderfully. But Tara knew Texas would cut that off in the second half, so she used other offensive strategies. She makes great halftime adjustments.

I've been a sports fan for about six decades. I've rooted for lots of teams, with lots of coaches. Tara is the best coach of any of those teams. In other words, she is my favorite coach of all time. I have more faith in her ability to give our team its best chance of winning than I've had in those dozens (hundreds, maybe) of other coaches.

Though we don't know when it will happen, someday relatively soon we will no longer have the chance to root for Tara's teams. Let's enjoy what we have left of a wonderful ride.