As Tennessee Is to Us, We Are to ND...And It Stinks

[ghostmutt]

I mean, seriously, what is ND Athletics all about...?

1) Being really good at football when the players wore leather helmets;
2) Having a famous D-lineman pro prospect who's a bit of an odd bird;
3) Competing well in Olympic and country club sports, but not so well as to be a dynastic power in any of them;

and

4) Defeating UConn women's basketball.

Everything notable about their program is based on beating us--2001 NC, 2011 and 2012 national semifinals, 2013 BE regular season win. Oh, and they've played well against a rebuilding (some might say "declining") Tennessee.

In 2011, ND had a national championship just sitting on a plate like a fat piece of birthday cake, and they choked on it versus Texas A&M. Freakin' A&M! The worst "flash-in-the-pan" champion since '06 Maryland.

Bottom line: Skylar Diggins will leave South Bend without a ring because Brittney Griner exists.

But UConn needs a win against them before she graduates to re-establish the pecking order. (And before they get mired in the meh that is the New Big East.) Preferably in the BET, since those faithless Irish jerks busted up a great basketball conference.

DEFEAT. THE. HEADBAND.

What is ND Athletics? Not a traitorous Benedict Arnold--since they were never a full conference affiliate, anyway--but a mercenary remora that sucks the blood out of any league it gets its greedy teeth into. You'll learn, ACC. You'll learn.

 

[JS]

I don't think the Tennessee analogy is more than superficial. ND has a good streak going against UConn the past few years. That's it. As I said in another thread, I think that streak has now likely played out, as we'll soon see.

The UConn - TN thing was much deeper. TN never got it going against UConn, and never owned the lopsided all-time margin UConn established against ND, which is yet to be jeopardized and will, IMO, grow again in coming years.

Plus, the essence of the UConn/TN thing was national championships -- the jewels in Pat's crown that Geno increasingly threatened to surpass. That's what inspired the blindly stupid, unscrupulous malice coming from some of the LV internet posters over a period of many years. Still exists I think, though it's blessedly less visible to UConn fans.

I said a few years ago that Geno would catch Pat in NCs within the foreseeable future, by which I meant by the time KML graduates. I still think that. There's nothing Muffett will likely be able to bring even to begin to crash that party.

 

[Icebear]

Despite the number of wins in recent games that record is over a relatively short time period because of the 3-4 times a year match-ups.

 

[uconnfan68]

Despite the number of wins in recent games that record is over a relatively short time period because of the 3-4 times a year match-ups.

It's been 4 games that past 2 years, and looking like that again this year. 12 games in 3 years, standing is UConn 4, ND 6 through 10 games. Since the start of competition, UConn 29, ND 10.

 

[ghostmutt]

JS, I take your point that the significance of the UConn-Tennessee rivalry will probably never be equalled, unless in a different (women's) sport.

UConn's '95 title, the escalation of the rivalry from '95-'99, the advents of the WNBA and ABL in '96, and the USA women's soccer World Cup victory in '99 all formed a confluence of events near the end of the last millennium that made American audiences receptive to women's team sports. After two decades of regular coverage on cable, fans now have entrenched positions (closely following it, or deliberately ignoring it) so that it's difficult for new rivalries to break through and capture national attention, like UConn-UT did.

I also agree that UConn and Tennessee facing off over and over with the NC on the line gave the rivalry its weight. One of my main gripes with ND as an "emerging power" is how underwhelmingly they perform in the title game.

The point is that ND's national reputation is almost totally based on success against one team: UConn. Just as UConn's ascent from 1995 to 2000 revolved around beating UT.

What is Notre Dame's best win of the Skylar Diggins era that didn't involve UConn? Probably their Elite Eight win over UT in 2011--and hardly over a "prime" Pat Summit, since she announced her Alzheimer's disease seven months later. ND lost to the weakest NCAA champion of the last decade. (Not to pick on Gary Blair, because I do think he's a good coach, and I was glad to see him get it as a sort of lifetime achievement award.) Baylor crushed the Irish thrice. ND edged Duke by 2 in a preseason tournament in 2011--that's the best win they have that doesn't involve UConn or an ailing PHS.

Please accept my apologies for sounding like a Duke men's basketball fan. ND is a second-tier team. They're only world beaters against us.

We had such a head start on them in the all-time series that it would take a 15 years for them to catch us, assuming the teams continue to play 1 or 2 times annually after the real Big East dissolves.

The point is that losing the last true BE tourney to ND would be absolutely the wrong foot for UConn to start out on in the brave new world that they're facing with their new conference mates. Like, cosmically, epically wrong. UConn carried water for the BE when it was us, Rutgers, and a bunch of spare parts. ND let the Big East implode.

I just wonder what the coach Shea Ralph thinks the player Shea Ralph would have made of Skylar Diggins woofing at the Gampel crowd after beating us on our home floor. Makes me think she would have come out of the tunnel with blond ponytail flying and scored 10 straight points, is what.

In summation: CRUSH. KILL. DESTROY. HEADBANDS.

 

[UConnCat]

I just wonder what the coach Shea Ralph thinks the player Shea Ralph would have made of Skylar Diggins woofing at the Gampel crowd after beating us on our home floor. Makes me think she would have come out of the tunnel with blond ponytail flying and scored 10 straight points, is what.

In summation: CRUSH. KILL. DESTROY. HEADBANDS.

And she would have felt Shea's fouls, unlike the brush fouls that were called last night. Shea would have put her on her .

Part of Diggins' woofing has to be motivated by her first appearance at Gampel when she was a freshman playing UConn on the Gameday Saturday night. Diggins was so overwhelmed by UConn's defense that she looked on the verge of tears all night. That embarrassment surely motivated her. Let's hope her final college game in CT is like her first.