FORT WORTH, Texas \u2014 Texas gave Michigan no time to get settled into Monday night\u2019s Elite Eight matchup.<\/p>\n
The Longhorns blitzed the Wolverines with their full-court pressure and efficient offense, jumping out to a 10-point lead in the first five minutes and riding that initial wave to their fifth Final Four appearance and second consecutive. Texas beat Michigan 77-41, locking in a highly anticipated rematch between the No. 1 seed Longhorns and No. 1 UCLA in the Final Four in Phoenix.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know we have got a big challenge on Friday, a great team, we\u2019ve seen them a long time ago,\u201d coach Vic Schaefer said.<\/p>\n
In November, Texas delivered UCLA its lone loss of the season, 76-65, in the Champions Era Championship.<\/p>\n
For much of the season, Texas\u2019 recipe for success has been the same: efficient offense and a defense that frustrates teams on every inch of the court. Though Texas shot 46 percent from the field, its offense went through major droughts on Monday. It went six minutes and 12 seconds without a basket in the second quarter, missing nine straight shots. Coach Vic Schaefer wasn\u2019t happy with the Longhorns\u2019 offensive execution, routinely telling them to run the plays he was calling. Still, things wouldn\u2019t work for Texas on offense, but the defensive side kept them ahead.<\/p>\n
During Texas\u2019 drought, Michigan missed 10 shots and scored just four points. Part of that was due to Texas\u2019 defense, which made every screen and cut difficult for the Wolverines. However, the Michigan duo of Olivia Olson and Syla Swords also couldn\u2019t buy a basket for much of the game. The sophomore duo combined for 19 points and shot just 5-of-28 from the field. The first half was especially bad. Olson didn\u2019t make her first basket until the 7:12 mark of the third quarter.<\/p>\n
That basket cut Texas\u2019 lead to just 11 points, the lowest since the first quarter, and Michigan coach Kim Barnes Arico later said she felt good about a potential comeback. Then Texas went on a run, and without their two leading scorers playing well, the Wolverines didn\u2019t have much of an answer.<\/p>\n
\u201cI felt OK, and then they went on this run, and we just couldn\u2019t get the rebound,\u201d Barnes Arico said. \u201cI think we got them to miss five straight times, and they got five straight rebounds, which is unheard of for us. We tried to go zone a little bit to give them that look, and that\u2019s kind of what we did (in a close regular-season loss) against Connecticut, but we were able to rebound out of it. We weren\u2019t able to rebound out of it (against Texas). And then I think that really deflated us. Then we couldn\u2019t score. Then they just extended it.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Longhorns\u2019 offense awakened in the third quarter.<\/p>\n
Led by top scorer and regional MVP Madison Booker, the Longhorns outscored Michigan 43-20 in the second half. The Wolverines got a major second-half boost from post players Kyla Oldacre and Justice Carlton, who combined for 22 of Texas\u2019 second-half points.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think the team is balanced, and it\u2019s so hard to stop,\u201d Booker said. \u201cI\u2019m so proud of them, they\u2019ve done such a tremendous job this season.\u201d<\/p>\n
Blowout wins aren\u2019t new for Texas in the last two months. Since losing to Vanderbilt on Feb. 12, the Longhorns have won 12 straight, including 10 by double figures.<\/p>\n
Texas has won its four NCAA Tournament games by a 35.5-point margin. There\u2019s an argument to be made that Texas is playing the best of any team left in the tournament. The Longhorns will get a chance to compete for that title when they play UCLA on Friday evening, giving Schaefer another chance to chase the national championship that has eluded him in his 21-year head-coaching career.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis group of ladies has been so special all year, but especially in these last eight weeks, they really have locked in and have been focused on the mission,\u201d Schaefer said. \u201cI felt like that when we were in (the SEC tournament) and felt like that coming into the NCAA Tournament.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FORT WORTH, Texas \u2014 Texas gave Michigan no time to get settled into Monday night\u2019s Elite Eight matchup.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":556000,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[399,1777,398,396,397,99,5690,2664],"class_list":{"0":"post-555999","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-michigan-wolverines","10":"tag-ncaa","11":"tag-ncaa-football","12":"tag-ncaafootball","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-texas-longhorns","15":"tag-womens-college-basketball"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/555999","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=555999"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/555999\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/556000"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=555999"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=555999"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=555999"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}