For 'Cinderella' Cardinals, This Feat Was No Fairy Tale
How sweet is this? Ball State's Kiley Jarrett, left, and Porchia Green celebrate Sunday's shocking upset of Tennessee.
(By Ed Reinke -- Associated Press)
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Tuesday, March 24, 2009
Perhaps it is appropriate that the team that pulled off one of the biggest upsets in NCAA women's basketball tournament history would hail from the same state that produced "Hoosiers." Much like Hickory, the tiny high school that won the Indiana tournament, the Ball State Cardinals weren't given much of a chance against the two-time defending champion Tennessee Lady Vols, winners of eight national titles.
And yet, the 12th-seeded Cardinals didn't just beat the Lady Vols; they thrashed them, 71-55, in Sunday night's first-round game in the West Region. What makes this result all the more surprising is not just that Tennessee had never lost in the first round, but that the Lady Vols had won their first-round games by an average of 44.6 points. No team had even come close to beating them.
"What I chose to do early on when we found out we were playing Tennessee was give [the players] a lot of facts," Ball State Coach Kelly Packard said. "The fact is that this is a storied women's basketball program. This has been a program that has defined women's basketball in our country."
Packard also shared the fact that the Lady Vols were a young team and that they were a mere No. 5 seed. By the time she finished detailing all of Tennessee's weaknesses, the Cardinals weren't intimidated anymore.
Still, Ball State hardly seemed suited for the role of giant killer. Consider the differences between the schools:
-- Tennessee had never missed an NCAA tournament; Ball State had never played in one.
-- Three of Ball State's starters are 5 feet 9 or shorter; Tennessee's shortest starter is 6 feet.
-- Tennessee Coach Pat Summitt is in her 35th season, has won 1,005 games and makes $1.275 million a season; Packard is in her first season, has won 26 games and makes $150,000.
Then there's the coaching tumult the players have been through the past 15 months. Assistant coach Lisa McDonald took over the program for the final 20 games of last season after then-head coach Tracy Roller took a leave of absence in December 2007 for what she later revealed was manic depression. McDonald then was passed over for the head coaching job, which was given to Packard last spring.
