Welcome to Good Game with Sarah Spain, where we're hugging Gino Oriema and telling him how much we hate him, and by hate, we of course mean love. It's Tuesday, April eighth, and on today's show, Big Citrus Riecan Beans to discuss Yukon's big win, Paige Becker's legacy, and all the Final four parties and events including Sweet Hangs with a Goat, plus Bad Backselly's using a floor to flip a narrative, and one of the greats hangs them up. It's all coming up right after this welcome back slices.
Here's what you need to know today. In college hoops, the number two seed Yukon Huskies defeated number one South Carolina eighty two fifty nine on Sunday to claim a record twelfth national championship and first since twenty sixteen. Azy Fund was named the most outstanding player of the Final Four, posting twenty four points and five boards in the chip, and Gino Oriema's coaching record in title games is now.
Twelve and one. No joke, ridiculous.
Paige Beckers ended her legendary career with her first title, putting up seventeen points in the victory, and freshman Sarah Stronk came up huge, adding twenty four points and fifteen boards. We'll talk more about the win and a big, fun Final Four weekend in Tampa later in the show.
More college hoops.
It's award season and Juju is racking them up. We told you last week that Juju Watkins was named the Naysmith National Player of the Year, and over the weekend, the USC star won a few more, including the John R. Wooden Award and the AP National Player of the Year award. While Juju's near term future is uncertain after she tore her acl in the second round of the NCAA attorney, we're sure she's got a big future and we can't wait to see what she does when she comes back.
As USC coach Lindsay Gottlieb told the ESPN, quote, her comebacks got.
To be legendary. End quote. Becker's picked up some hardware two.
On Thursday, she won the twenty twenty five Wade Trophy, presented by the Women's Basketball Coaches Association to the nation's top player, and on Saturday, she took home the Naismith Hall of Fame's Nancy Lieberman Award, which honors the nation's top point guard. She also won the Liberman Trophy back in twenty twenty one.
More hoops.
It's officially the end of an era, as Elena Deladan announced her retirement at the end of last week. The two time WNBA MVP shared the news on Instagram, writing quote, my body seemed to make this decision before my mind accepted it, but I now truly know this is the right thing for me at the right time.
End quote.
Deledhan led the Washington Mystics to a WNBA title in twenty nineteen, all while playing with three herniated disks in her back. She underwent two surgeries on her back in twenty twenty and then played just three games in her WNBA return in twenty twenty one. She played limited games in both twenty twenty two and twenty twenty three, and
then sat out last season. Lena is one of my all time favorite players, a big that could shoot the three and bring the ball up, an absolute badass at the collegiate and pro level, and a truly wonderful, empathetic person who brought a unique perspective to the game and to life. Due to her sister Lizzie, who was born
deaf and blind with cerebral palsy and autism. Elena's signature shoe, the air del Don, was built intentionally to allow access points for folks with special needs and designed with her sister in mind. Shout out to my memories of her first few months in Chicago, when we ate deep dish together, went to the beach with our dogs, and I tried to set her up with a hot, tall Midwestern dude.
I was barking up the wrong tree there.
Congrats on an amazing career, Elena, from wines to woodworking and your wife Amanda's incredible invention the shot fun.
I can't wait to see what else is next for you.
Two unrivaled friend of the show, Annie Constable, who's now with Front Office Sports, congrats on the job and the move to NYC.
Annie wrote a.
Story about the upstart three on three league, and it's really good.
Inaugural season.
Costable reported that the league made twenty seven million dollars in revenue in year one and per league commissioner Mickey Lawler, quote almost broke even while it often takes leagues years even decades to become profitable unrivaled execs believe the league could reach that threshold by next season. Will link to Annie Store in our show notes. Final piece of Hoops News. Indiana Fever star Caitlin Clark is the latest guest on David Letterman's Netflix show My Next Guest needs no introduction.
The episode available today includes a sit down at Letterman's alma mater, Ball State, footage from Letterman's visit to a Fever Sun game at Gainbergerina, and his trip to Clark's jersey retirement ceremony.
In Iowa and February. One of my proudest moments in this business was getting.
A call from the show to hop on a zoom with Dave and talk all things Clark to prep him for the episode.
I'm a huge fan, like.
Checked out books about Letterman starting at age eight with dreams of growing up to be a late night host. So spending ninety minutes just chopping it up about women's hoops and fielding all of his questions about Caitlin and the WNBA was genuinely an honor, and he was so cool and so interested in learning more.
About the space.
And I even get a nice thank you in the show credits a pinch me moment for sure to soccer. The US women's national team played its first of time two friendlies against Brazil on Saturday, winning two nil in the rematch of last summer's Olympic gold medal game. Over thirty two three hundred fans were in attendance for the first ever women's professional sporting event at SOFI Stadium in
southern California. Trinity Rodman suited up for the national team for the first time since winning gold in Paris and scored in just the fifth minute of the game.
Now, given that Rodman's been dealing.
With back injuries for years, her choice of Sally had a lot of people, including the team's medical staff, a little bit worried she faked a back injury after the goal, before laughing and dancing instead. After the game, Rodman said she should have told the medical staff of her CELLI plans in advance before adding quote, but you know you gotta keep people on their toes end quote. Lindsay Heaps formerly Haran made it too nil for the US in the second half thanks to a penalty kick earned by
Lily Johannes and goalkeeper Fallen Tellis. Joyce earned a shutout in her US women's national team debut. The US and Brazil meet again tonight in San Jose, California. That game starts at ten thirty pm Eastern. You can watch on TBS, MAC, Universo or Peacock to College Gymnastics, The National Championship field is down to eight teams, with LSU, Michigan State, Utah, UCLA, Oklahoma, Missouri, Florida, and Alabama making the cut for the National Championships in
Fort Worth, Texas, on April seventeenth and nineteenth. In addition to those eight teams, the top twenty individual athletes from teams that didn't qualify will also compete. That includes Olympian and Oregon State athlete Jade Carey. While Carrie has won two Olympic gold medals and three world titles in her career, an NCUBA title still eludes her. She's won five medals at the NCUBA Championships during her time at Oregon State, but never a gold.
We got to take a quick break when we come back. Is that sweat or tears?
A little bit of both, to be honest, a little bit of both. Two thirds of Big Citrus went to Tampa and we're back to tell you all about it, stick around, welcome back slices, Big Citrus, here to chat about all things NCAA tournament.
I can't believe the season's over.
It was like it totally lived up everything, but it's still a giant bummer. Misha and I were both in Tampa, so we have some stories to tell about parties and events and everything else. And of course we'll all get into some conversation about pagebackers, legacy, yukon getting back on top and everything else. But Mesh, I think if I was gonna sum up Tampa in one word, it would just be sticky.
Mm hmm yep.
Very accurate, very accurate.
Man.
First of all, when I checked the weather as I was packing and it said ninety one degrees every day, I'm like, but not really, it won't really be ninety one.
Every No, it was.
And as soon as I stepped outside even for a minute, my body would go, oh, are we working out great?
And then just start pouring sweat.
Yep. And anytime I had to go anywhere, everything is, you know, within like two blocks three blocks of each other. So we were like, yeah, let's walk. We don't need to uber baby.
When I tell you.
I hit that spin scooters so quickly I could. I've never been more uncomfortable in my entire life. And I've been to Cairo, Egypt. Like it was hot.
Yeah, it reminded me of Miami, but in like August, where you walk outside and your sunglasses steam up and you have to my glasses.
You can't see y'all can't see this, but I have my glass. My glasses were fogged up every time I wore them. It was in April.
In April, and then the hair.
It reminded me of New Orleans for the Super Bowl, Like I couldn't go outside for one second without looking like Monica from Friends when she went to that tropical island. I was like, this is it was a lot. I do not know how people live that way. Every time I stay, I'm from Chicago and people like, mmm, but it's so cold. I'm like, bitch, I get seasons and we just go inside to like a cool pub with a fireplace and enjoy it.
We're not like, I don't know how they're I don't know how they're doing that down there, Misha.
I want to start by hearing about your weekend with Rising media Stars. This is the group you were selected to be a part of that's run by La China Robinson.
What was it like? I saw you down on the court for all the games?
It was once again incredible, ten out of ten, no notes. When I tell y'all the China Robinson is, I said her name. That's all I had to do in all of these spaces, and Everybody's like, oh yeah, she just she carries so much power, but she carries it so gracefully and the reason she you know, wielded it. This weekend was for the five of us in my cohort for the class of twenty twenty five of her mentorship program.
And man, when I tell you, we were at every press conference, every open locker room, every mixed media zone, every networking event. It was exhausting, as you can probably guess. But also like I feel like every time I leave a weekend with that crew, I feel more and more confident about, you know, what it is I want.
To do, and so amazing.
It's just I can't even put it all into words. I just want to say, shout out to her, Shout out to Kevin Nixon, shout out to Ty Davis who was helping us out Shantiana Key's one of the members of a former class. She was there helping us out. I mean, and I met so many of the folks we've had on the show too. I was able to, you know, step aside for a second and say hey, by the way, I also produce good game with Air Spain and Nancy Armor any constable Katie Barnes, thank.
You for coming on.
You know that was just it was incredible in so many different ways.
And you said no notes, but you actually had notes with you at all times. Oh yeah, me had this notebook just like top to bottom, handwritten notes. You could tell that they were just like putting in work all weekend. I have to say my favorite thing was I was spending most of my time up in the espnW swite. So first of all, shout out espnW for the hospitality. I was bringing in friends of the show, Jane McManus, Aaron Foley, all these folks just like just tell them
where's sweet we're in and come on in. We don't need to get any permission. So shout out to the SPNW for the hospitality. But from my vantage point, I could always see me shown on the court, creeping court, creeping because Okay, first of all, most of the time when you weren't directly doing something like chatting with someone or taking a photo, you were dancing, which I just loved because I can see energy from afar and I
could see how excited you were. You were just so pumped to be on the floor surrounded by these athletes like you were just dancing every time I looked at you, except for the one time when you were zipping up your fly now, which was hilarious because I was already filming you, like to see, because I was like, let me film me, like just like behind the scenes style taking a picture with the cohort, And then you turned toward me in the camera and I see you fumbling
with you I'm like, oh, me had her fly down, and they were like mid many photos. So the first however many photos taken, you one thousand percent have your fly down.
It was not my fly.
I did not, so Sarah text to be afterwards to confirm or deny that fact, and I was reading it so quickly, so many things were happening. I said, yes, it was not my fly, it was my belt and I wanted to tuck my shirt in. Okay, so I did not have my fly down, but I did think that video was absolutely hilarious because you can kind of see my head bobbing and I'm lokey like me and the camera van are going back and forth.
My guy time.
It's all of But I was like, now, Ty, why are you gonna take this picture? When I've turned the other way? He was clicking, I heard the shutter.
Can I ask for a video review on this? I want to see the original footage for me.
The footage is on Sarah's Instagram. I'm not all the way turned towards her, so you know.
She's doing something down there, is all I'm saying. Maybe it was a tuck, maybe it was a zip. Either way, I'm glad you had a good time. You ended up at a party with a bunch of coaches dancing, which I love a little behind the scenes on the coaches letting loose.
Yeah it was your favorite player's favorite coach was in there. Yeah, having a great time, and I was having a great time. It was The party was fantastic. I got a shout out my fellow Virginia native Kenneth Panell, who throws that party.
I believe every year.
This is my first time working a Final Four having that you know level of.
I don't know, networking connections access.
Yeah, so I'd never been to them, but supposedly it's the best party of the Final Four every year, so up to expectations, Like I don't even I don't want to say too much.
Well, while you were there, I was at the Together party, which had just a tiny VIP list of Diana Tarassi, Sue Bird, Brienna Stewart, Aliah Boston, Aliah Edwards. You know, just like a you know, it was chill. It was chill, but the parties were good. The Final Four Tourney Town, presented by Capitol One was awesome.
Like, the activations were next level.
It was really cool to see how much brands put behind the activations that they did there.
The kids everywhere so cute.
Yeah, I mean and adults, and like the enthusiasm was next level, which was awesome. My live show with Diana and Sue went really great. Y'all can listen to that. The episode is up. We were hoping to get some more video and maybe even throw the whole show up so you can watch the whole thing. We're still working on all that, but definitely go back and listen, especially the part about the retirement gift for Diana. We will
have more details on that. It is in the works of being built, but thankfully she did not punch me.
She was excited about it.
As we were walking backstage after the show, she goes, wait, is that like real? Though, I'm like, oh, honey, it's real, Like there's going to be a bench in Wisconsin in the middle of a random park that is yours. But yeah, there will be an elaborate ribbon cutting. I think I'm gonna bring a live goat that seems appropriate. If I can't get Diana there, we'll at least have another goat or two. But yeah, there's a big plan around that. We'll let you know when that's happening. Speaking of goats.
By the way, Mesha and I were in the w suite with Maya More and what was hilarious was I wore one of our shirts from the show Good Game, Good Game, F you, and it's just an F with asterisks. But when I walked in, my friend from espnW, Serita, said, oh my god, I love the shirt blah blah blah, and Sid and TP were like, well, who's the FU And I'm like h Sidney Cholson and Teresa plays once who'd been on the show before Friends of the Show, and oh my god, I got to figure it out.
And then Serita was like, yeah, whoever takes a fence at the shirt first?
And I'm like, yeah, perfect.
So then later in the suite, I asked Maya for a selfie and she and her handler are like, okay, but you can't get the shirt in it. Oh my god, she is a woman of God. And I was like, oh, no, rules are rules.
Oh rules are rules. Good game, good game. F you Maya Moore is I guess you.
Left that context out when you told me about what I know.
Oh? All I told you was that my made sure and I was trying to angle my body to make sure you couldn't see.
The f and the asterisks.
That's where you got to put out to her little hand, just a little hand on the tummy or somewhere.
Just wow.
Shout out to her for sticking with her principles. But I was cracking up when she said that, was like.
Oh no, Maya, rules are rules. But the shirt got so much love. Can I tell you?
Walking into the game, around the game, walking out of the game, walking down the street. I would just hear people saying it aloud, and then I would look at them and be.
Like, oh, sorry, I like your shirt.
They're like good game, good, Oh that's great, Like that's hilarious, or where can I get that?
So it's a hit.
Did you get to see slices in the wild wearing merch too? Because that blew my mind when I first started thinking about it.
I sure did.
There were a bunch of folks who came to the live show with Diana and Sue.
I saw and I'm a slice.
I saw a couple on with the bulls asked me about women's sports. I got sent a lot of photos of people in that. So yeah, the merch is out there, y'all.
That was really exciting. That was really cool. All right, we gotta talk about the games.
I mean, the parties were good, the events were good, the activations, Misha's pseudo internship.
But the games. What what's happened? Y'all?
We first of all, congrats to us on all of our predictions being correct as to who would win, and then literally nothing else.
Let's start with those final four games.
I mean, the Texas one wasn't that surprising to me as soon as their defense wasn't able to hold South Carolina in that first half. Even though it was a tight game at the half, you already knew that their strategy wasn't working and that South Carolina was gonna probably make their way.
But I just didn't expect that big of a blowout.
Yeah, I thought they would hang in there a little bit longer. I just think there's levels to this, right, Dawn and Gino ended up in the National Championship game in their squads as well. For a reason, they've found a formula that works season after season after season. And you know, Texas and Vic Schaeffer. I'm not gonna say he's not an amazing coach.
We had him here.
He's a friend of the show, you know. But Texas had a lot of pieces that hadn't quite been to that stage just yet. In South Carolina, as we know, won the National Championship last season going undefeated, so they've more than been there before and had that experience. And so I think for Texas and the same thing with UCLA, once we get to that game, I just think it took them a little longer to really settle in, and by the time they did it was like, baby, it's too late.
Yeah, I think Ucla for sure. What we saw was Lauren Bett still got hers. Her ends to tistic wasn't bad, but at the end her box score didn't look bad.
But nobody else could hit. Yeah.
And the point with that UCLA team is, if you're gonna shut down Lauren Bett's enough, which I think Yukon more than any team i'd seen before, didn't just double a triple team her, but they got really active with their hands inside disrupting her when she caught the ball. That led to not just steals, but making her much more uncomfortable in there. She tried to get her shot off faster, she tried to make a move without letting them get in and try to steal the ball like
it just made her more uncomfortable. But she still did a great job of using her footwork, pivoting out, kicking it out and no one could hit shit.
Yeah, and that was the big difference. That was it.
Corey Close said in the in the pregame press conference that the plan was not just for Lauren to score the basketball.
That's tier one.
Tier two was Okay, we're gonna work inside out, offensively, pass the ball into her and then our shooters are going to relocate.
That was literally the whole game plan.
Not the whole game plan, I'm sure I'm not in those huddles, but what she told us the game plan was. And when you don't have anybody else supporting you against the team like Yukon, you gotta have everybody aggressive across the board. You gotta have at least three or four people in double figures. And frankly, also you gotta be able to play some defense and stop them. And the way you Kon looked offensively, that was a machine. That
was an absolute machine. And asy Fud shout out to her because that was her first double digit game of the NCAA tournament, that final four game against UCLA, and she set the tone.
She set the tone. She had been struggling.
We saw, of course that for nine or for eleven start or whatever in the previous game found her shot in the fourth quarter, and Page kind of joked with her, you saving all your buckets for the final four, and
the answer was clearly yes. But it makes a big difference when Azy sets the tone because they're gonna work so hard to try to shut down Sarah and Page and then you just don't have enough bodies to shut down all three of them, which is of course what we ended up seeing in the final game as well.
Asy Fud I loved.
Her family wearing the shirts fud around and find out really And you remember in the regular season, South Carolina got absolutely busted by yukon an absolute blowout, and it was Easy who led the way in that one. I think she had twenty eight points. They didn't have an answer for her, and when she came out hot, I was like, ooh, this is bad news for sci because
they kept it tight. I think it was nineteen fourteen after the first quarter, but you saw a z was the one making all the buckets, and you're like, ooh, this is gonna be bad because you know that Sarah and Paige are gonna find theirs.
Yeah, it's as a player when you know you've put up numbers against the team before, when you see that team again, oh, you're immediately licking your chops. And I just feel like, you know, Azy Fudd obviously her demeanor, I think pages and even more so Sarah Strong's, they're all kind of you know, reserved. I'll say, you know, I'll answer questions in the presser, all that stuff, But when it comes down to it, y'all don't get to
see what the real dog looks like. It's the last step foot on the core and asy just she turned it on, ended.
Up twenty four points, five assists, three steals.
That's what happened.
To say, steal, she picked my laser, four.
Cookies and you know who else.
Kk Arnold defensively was an energizer bunny out there. Every time you turned around, she was hustling to the ball, making a stop, just really aggressive. And that you noticed in the first half, especially with Yukon, is every single one of them was so fast to the ball, fast passing, especially that first quarter.
If that pace had kept.
Up, oh boy, no one was missing and they were going fast. And I have to say that it was probably not the best strategy for South Carolina, but when you're hitting all your shots like that, you're like, let's keep going.
But that benefited Yukon.
It would have been better for South Carolina slowed things down because there was no way they were going to keep getting stops like that. And you knew with the way that Yukon's offense worked, they would be able to stay efficient like that, and it just South Carolina had some players step up, for sure, but woo yeah, that fed right into Yukon's hands.
I'm curious what the vibe was like in the arena in terms of South Carolina versus Yukon fans, especially in that third quarter when Yukon really separated themselves.
Where were you?
Meh, because I was actually where our suite was was closer to a bunch of South Carolina fans, so it sounded like sixty forty Game Cocks fans. When the game started, the DJ DJ shawna shout out. DJ Shauna, she's normally working Milwaukee Bucks games. She was doing all the DJing for the final four. She shouted out and did a vibe check of like, let me hear all the Yukon fans.
Oh super loud. We're like, wow, let me hear South Carolina way louder.
Now again, I don't know if that was where I was in the arena, but there was a lot of South Carolina representation. And then to your point, Alex come her third quarter crickets, yep, crickets.
It was. It was tough.
So I was kind of everywhere a little bit. We were going from the floor to see you in the suite for all of two seconds to going back to the media workerroom. So but what I will say is looking from the court up at the stands behind the two benches, it was like an even fifty to fifty split. Like we were over on the Yukon side Sarah, So where Sarah was sitting, she could look down at me. I was in the corner right in front of all the
Yukon alums and family and that stuff. So from that side of the arena it was sixty forty.
So it was an even split. Both probably pretty even.
Yeah, both fan bases definitely traveled well, had a lot of folks in their repon. But yeah, come third quarter, when I went back to the media workroom to start working on the things that China had for us, every time Yukon scored, we could hear it from all the way back there and we were pretty far away from the court.
So yeah, I mean then it was just fans getting excited about some big plays and you know me. She mentioned that there's a stoicism a little bit sometimes to Asy and Sarah and Paige, But Paige, when she's having fun, it's so joyful to watch and I think sometimes. So we got in a late night debate with a whole bunch of ladies at a table because one of them said Paige isn't a dog, and I.
Was like, hold up, hold up. Then we got into the whole I was like.
Listen, We've extensively discussed this on our show What makes a dog? What makes a glue gal? Can you be a dog in a glue gal? Can you be a glue gal and a superstar? Like all this other stuff? And I'm like, thankfully, most of the table, I'm not going to out anybody might run a popular women's sports brand, slash company, slash website, slash social outlet.
I'm not going to out anyone in my name.
But this person had some backup on the page ain't a dog debate And the rest of the table was like, you're out of your f and mind.
And I think it's for two reasons.
One still has a total babyface and is built. In my opinion, if I give you the animal jack Rabbit, you cannot find a better animal. That page looks and acts like like she is straight up and down with a ton of bounce. She's strong, but she doesn't look super strong. She just looks like a kid. And then she laughs a lot and has a lot of joy when she plays. And if you mistake that for not being a dog, you get beat by thirty points in the National Championship.
I don't know how you say she's not a dog. When I saw her hit it and one I think it was in the elite eight. Uh and turn and look at the defender and say a freking one and and put the you know the celebration they do where they put their shoulders forward. Man, that's that's what hoopers do. That's what dogs do. So if that's not dog, I don't. I don't know what a dog is.
She's a dog's also husky.
She's literally she's literally a dog. Literally. We had the we had the jack rabbit conversation. Someone said, would pecker. I saw that. Someone said kangaroo.
I said, not big enough in the in the shoulders, in the chest, because kangaroos are jacked.
I think she's a jack rabbit.
And I think you take her because of the braids and the nice smiley face and how much joy she has out there, you underestimate what a dog she is.
But okay, my argument correct me.
Like listen, I think Aasy paced them for sure in the final and Asy was a huge piece of everything. I think you could argue Sarah Strong as most outstanding player of the final four.
Absolutely, so I have a ballot to vote, and that was the hardest decision because I wanted both of them to win.
I wanted both of them to.
Get that reward because Sarah Strong actually outscored Azy Fund. Sarah Strong actually broke the freshman record in an NCAA tournament one hundred and fourteen points, the most ever scored by a freshman. She absolutely did her thing, so I think there was definitely an argument for that, but because
of the way she did it, Sarah Strong. Don Staley said that Sarah Strong could be in the next three years the best player to come out of Yukon, and I full, full throated, fullhearted, I stand behind what Don said. I was arguing with people all weekend about that after she said that. It's because what Sarah Strong does isn't flashy. Sometimes it is, sometimes it is, but she just gets
the job done. It doesn't matter what you throw at her. Small, big, you know, post, somebody kind of a hybrid like her, it doesn't matter. She's eating them for lunch, but she's not doing it with flair, so people overlook it. But she absolutely could have won most.
She's not demonstrative out there in terms of like her reactions or celebrations, but she gets it done. And to your point, the situation, especially in those moments where you expect someone with her like it's like Gino said on our show, someone built like her should not be able
to do the things she does. And you notice it most when her movement can't be intentional because it's on a turnover or someone disrupts the ball, or the passes a little bit over her, and she shouldn't be able to gather, collect and go up and make the layup because the pass is leading her out of bounds, and she does it anyway.
It's in those moments that.
You're like, damn, a freshman at that size that can do that much with her body. Her body control is insane. And then hit the threes and then play in the big position and play outside as a guard like it is wild to say she might be the best player to come out of Yukon when you look at the players that have come and then at the same time, you're like, watching what she just did as a freshman, it's it's one thousand percent believable.
Yeah, and even more than that.
And this is not a knock on Page or whatsoever, because they've both been through their trials and tribulations with the knee injuries and all of that. But it's no coincidence to me that they win a championship when Sarah Strong is on the team, you know what I mean, Like, she's that impactful. So yeah, but they also needed to be healthy.
And also, I think if we watch that game three or four more times, one of the things we see is like perfect picks from everybody, and what you don't then see is how somebody benefits from a player that can't rotate and close out, and Sarah benefits from Page and Easy being fundamentally so sound as well.
So yes, of course they.
Have to be healthy, they have to play together enough times. They're a tough team because we see them in the regular season and they don't have as many matchups against good teams, so it's hard for us to get a read on them. Honestly, that beat down of South Carolina, we were like, was that an anomaly or is that how good they are? Well, guess what, They outscored their appointents by one hundred and ninety seven points in the tournament.
Aside for the yeah, tied for the fourth largest point differential ever in a single NC Double A tournament, according to ESPN Stats and Information. They had the biggest final four win of all time in that semi final against UCLA, and they were not that far off the biggest point differential and the title game either. I mean, this team steamrolled everything in front of them.
Sarah wells that number. How many did they outscore.
Their pubs one hundred and ninety seven points total in the NC DOUBLEA tournament?
That is? I mean, I guess they did have that one oh three to like thirty four win in game one of the tourney, which you know helps a little bit, but yeah, wild.
Yeah, I mean, and listen, this is uh Don Staley I think had some really telling when she's always so smart and composed in the way she articulates even after a loss, and I think to be able to say immediately that we lost to a very good basketball team and they beat our ass, but they didn't make us like it. There's a difference, right to be able to say immediately, I'm not going to comfort my players that
are crying. I'm gonna let them sit in it because I think that will benefit them and it'll make them come back stronger. Like the coaching that's already happening in her head. Immediately, whatever the natural instinct is, she might already be processing through that what's next and.
What's best for my team.
I think the quote I thought so not the most to me was she said, I think they had a better team this year. You don't always win when you have the better team, but they had the better team this year and they won, and that's what you're supposed to do.
Right.
There's probably been moments where Don has out coached and been able to outstrategize.
A better team. This is not one of them. And you could see on the bench the frustration.
That gift of her yelling the F word, which was not fud It was a different word, but might have.
Been fun at times as well.
Not maya more approved?
Yeah, not maya more approved? Is right? That gift is gonna get some work, Yes, for sure, yes it is.
But we gotta give a shout out to Don's daycare, all those kids that senior class that's going out.
They did win a title.
That group is going to be special in their own ways in their professional careers. But yeah, I mean it was just and it's funny coming in. I picked Yukon here on the show, but we also did social media predictions for rising media stars. And to be a contrarian, because everybody else picked Yukon, I found a way to rationalize South Carolina even when my head was telling me Yukon. I would have been perfectly fine of South Carolina one
as well. But my rationale was they've got more weapons, more options, more fresh legs, Yukon doesn't necessarily have as much room for error. And it ended up kind of being flipped on its head in the end because to me, Yukon won because they had people they knew they could go to, and South Carolina was trying to figure out who was going to be that entire time, and so that.
Would also like mistake three, mistake free basketball in the game against UCLA and then basically mistake free ball in the National Championship too.
They knew they had to play. That's what makes Yukon so great. If we have to encapsulate what it is that Gino puts into all his players is that they know their standard is just.
They're not making mistakes.
Yea, they wanted to take themselves out of a game, like a lot of teams will take themselves out a game with turnovers and otherwise, they didn't do that. To your point about the game, Cocks though, one of the greatest four year stretches for a team, and they're still in it because going to the national championship even if
you lose it as a part of that. But look at someone like Bree haul four trips to the final four, three appearances in the National Championship game, two national championships, winning in twenty twenty two and twenty twenty four, like that's it's an unbelievable run. That's a better run than anyone that's at Yukon right now.
Exactly.
Yeah, because it's been a little while for Yukon and that was kind of wild too to think about that it had been since twenty sixteen since Yukon won it all, and to think about I.
Think Gino's a different guy.
And the one thing I regret about my interview with Sue and Diana that I meant to ask and I forgot was do you think Gino is just coaching differently because it's a different kind of player now, or do you also think that the players are getting a different Gina, because in my opinion, they're getting a different Geno this early seventies knows that he only has X amount of years left, understands what the players need from him in this era.
I think it's a different geno because.
Like Sue and Fi Defista, Callier both saw the clip of Gino crying about Page at the presser and they were adamant that he was not crying. They said, we know him, there is no way he's crying. And every other person was like, that man is crying. That is a man who is crying. And I think he's a different guy now in the best possible way for this current era.
Yeah, I totally agree with you, and I don't think you know that's uncommon, like even for the best of the best, the most hard knows, the most intense, you know. I remember I had a high school coach who I thought for a while.
Was the devil.
I was like, lady, ain't no way, ain't no way they're letting you coach high school play. But she was an excellent coach. I love her so much.
Shout out coach Kelly.
But she even told us, and we had former players come back and say, oh, that lady is not the same lady.
And it's just the natural progression of things, right.
You get older, you get a little bit more sentimental. The kids are younger in relation to you. You don't want to hurt their feelings, but you also want to make sure you're supporting them as a whole person. And I think Gino just is naturally on that course of evolution. So but I don't know. I'm still undecided as to whether he was crying or not, though, because at the press conference I was at, you know, I wasn't there for the moment that everybody's alleging that he was crying for.
But at the press conference I was at. At the final four, he does rub his eyes a lot.
You know.
He literally used Page to clean his glasses one time he's tied. The dude was in his early seventies, like, so it's hard to call it.
It's hard to call it.
He actually was crying.
I'll tell you who was crying, Me and everyone in the suite when Page came off the court for the final time and hugged him and then hugged her teammates. Literally there was a row of all four of us, just like while I'm crying, get the next me too, Like I'm not even gonna hide it, We're crying.
It was very sweet.
So given that we were just one hundred percent right about how this was all going to play out this weekend, at least in terms of the final results, and not anything that happened in the games, this feels like a safe space to put out a theory and I want to get your thoughts on it.
I think Gino is done.
No, he's nope, he's got. He said it in the press conference that he's got. He didn't say explicitly I have five six seven years, but he was talking about what the future of the program could look like and used five six seven years from now, when I may or may not be here, And so I think he's definitely considering, you know, what it looks like in the
next few seasons. But after this, oh no, unless he wants to pull a DT, unless they're literally just from the same tree and he wants to just drop out of this guy and say, hey, I'm gone.
Uh I don't think so.
No, so I before the tournament started, I wondered that, and I think alc after we interviewed him, I again had my one regret, which was he said to us, I should have retired after Brianna Steward and we won four in a row. And I was like, oh, I got to follow up on that, and he kept talking for I forgot to follow up, and I was like, shit, I want to ask more intentionally, like what the timeline looks like for how long you're going to be coaching.
And I think right when the tournament started, you could have convinced me that maybe if they won, he would go out on top, you know with page But two things. One his face when I asked her about Sarah Strong and getting to have her for the next couple of years, there was like almost too much joy in the idea of like this this player is so good.
I'm not leaving while this player is there.
But also I know Nancy Armor was asking him a lot of questions about when he might be done, and he said a couple things. One of her posts, she said, Gino said he quits multiple times a year, and then he gets to the final four and gets rejuvenated.
Quote, this ruins my life every.
Year coming here, meaning like I get my life gets ruin because I know I'm coming back. And then she followed that up and said, Gino says, so long as his players are still responding to him, he'll keep coaching. When they don't, that's when it'll be time to go. And there's no argument they're so responding based on them winning and based on the relationship he has with his current players.
So Ali would have been with you on that.
But I think we got at least another couple of years of Geno, And I do think. I do think as a coach that's been around as long as he hasn't done as much as he has, you don't owe
anyone anything. But I do think when you have a reputation like Gino and you are heavily recruiting with the impression that someone's coming to play for you, there almost needs to be a warning that the end is coming or this is how many years I'm going to be here, because I think it's really hard on the program and on the players that you respect to mislead them into committing and then leave.
So at what point does he start giving players that warning then, right cause I think that the conversation about Sarah Strong is a good one, right, Like, how do you leave a program when you have Sarah Strong as a freshman, But when Sarah Strong is a senior, he's doing his job, you'll have another freshman.
Yeah.
Yeah, And the question is whether you just announce it two years in advance or something, and you let players know that, hey, I still want to get coached by him before he's gone and I can always transfer, or they make a decision that they don't they want to go somewhere where there won't be some sort of transfer of power. It's hard too, because when you're Yukon and you've got Gino for as long as you have, normally there'd be someone who potentially is going to step up in his absence.
But Chris Daily has been there as long as he has. She's not a.
Spring chicken who's going to be like, well it's mine now, let me tell you something.
So it was the funniest thing ever. I was right there when they were cutting down the net, right in front of the ladder. Right Chris Daly's turn comes to cut down the net. She ain't even want to go up there. She was like, I've been here before. The players are like CD CD.
She's looking at.
Them like this is just another day, you know what I mean. And it gives their duo that goes out together.
Yeah, I think so. Speaking of going out, we got to wrap this up. We could be talking about this team and these players forever. I just want to say how happy I am that everyone stayed healthy.
Mm hmm.
Paige got the dub, Sarah and Azy showed out. We're gonna get more of the incredible game Cox team. We're gonna get more of the incredible Yukon team. It is just making me even more fired up for next year.
And the DMV won again. Everybody.
I just couldn't hit this segment without saying ay.
The IVY League came out on top because Caitlyn Chen was repping the Smarties.
Yes and the Asies of the World Unite.
Note.
I was second guessing myself all weekend because of you, alex Asie.
I was like, is it Asi fun?
Asy fun?
Anyways, I did tweet this well, I technically blues guide it whatever the word for that is, skeat it, but I was like, I think the number of people that mispronounced. My name is about to go way up and I'm okay with it, you.
Know, yep, that's right, that's right. Uh.
Well, we had a blast in Tampa. Shout out to all the people that were involved with making it a good time except for the weather. We got to take another break when we come back. A power move that'll really floor you.
Come all back, Welcome back, slices.
We love that you're listening, but we want to get you in the game every day too, So here's our good game play of the day.
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Good game at wondermedianetwork dot com and you know what I'm going to say, don't forget to subscribe, rate and review. Seriously, do it. How many times have you heard me say it? Go give us five stars? Say something nice. It's easy watch flipping the script on a memorable screw up, rating ten out of ten stars, really raising the bar review Friend of the Show Jenny Wynn has a new addition to her famed women's sports bar at the Sports Bra
in Portland, Oregon. She's got a piece of the incorrectly marked court that hosted games during last year's NCAA tournament.
Now you might remember this. There were some controversy last.
Year because five full tournament games were played on a Portland court that had the wrong dimensions for one of the three point lines. It was about nine inches short of regulation at its apex. Now, the lines were redrawn before the regional final between Yukon and usc but it was an embarrassing moment for the NCAA, and frankly, it was an infuriating one for US women's sports fans who are sick and tired of women's sports getting less investment
and less care. Well, Jenny looked on the bright side of things and thought that the screw up gave the women's tournament attention, not necessarily good attention, but attention nonetheless. So I asked her how she managed to procure a piece of the floor, and she said it was all serendipity. So a friend of a friend is an installer for NCUBA and WNBA floors and he happens to be a huge fan of the Sports Bra. His wife was a
college athlete and they have seven daughters. So he was the one who fixed the Portland floors and he had the incorrect boards. So months later he reached out to Jenny and asked if she wanted him. Hell yeah, she did so now the Sports Bra has turned the floors into a new bar top with a great story.
We love that.
Now it's your turn rate and review. Thanks for listening, slices, See you tomorrow. Good Game, yukon Good Game, Sports Bra you Tampa humidity in April?
How do y'all live like that?
Good Game with Sarah Spain is an iHeart women's sports production in partnership with Deep Blue Sports and Entertainment. You can find us on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Production by Wonder Media Network, our producers are Alex Azzie and Misha Jones. Our executive producers are Christina Everett, Jesse Katz, Jenny Kaplan, and Emily Rudder. Our editors are Emily Rutterer, Britney Martinez and Grace Lynch.
Our associate producer is Lucy Jones, and I'm Your Host Sarah Spain right st