I have three regrets in my life up to this point. The first is falling asleep during the 2006 Rose Bowl. This was the game where Texas upset USC, and nothing would have made me happier than to see the USC Trojans fall in a miraculous Longhorn comeback led by Vince Young.
The second happened during my senior year of high school when two of my friends and I decided it would be a good idea to put dry ice in two-liter bottles half-filled with water to see how loud this would make the bottles pop. We did this while trespassing on private property — with a cop stationed a little bit down the road. This was a cop who happened to think that popping dry ice bottles sounds a lot like gunfire.
The third happened this past Monday. You see, a few of my fellow Cavalier Daily reporters and I had been planning to take a road trip that day to Knoxville, Tenn. to see the Virginia’s women’s basketball team take on the reigning national champions, the most storied women’s basketball program under the most decorated women’s basketball coach: Tennessee, led by Pat Summitt.
But I canceled the trip the day before. There was a project I needed to work on, and I had a Monday evening class. I didn’t want to drive over six hours each way to spend the rest of the month getting mocked by my housemates for making a road trip “just to watch some women’s basketball.”
And here I sit now, watching “SportsCenter” recap the Cavaliers’ 83-82 victory against the Volunteers, weeping into my bowl of cereal. How could I have passed up on this opportunity? I was so close to going. I even had worked out most of the arrangements. I have the rest of my college career to go to class and work on projects — was it really worth missing greatness to not fall another day or two behind?
This game was in fact a great one. Last night, Virginia became the 10th team to ever beat the Lady Vols at Thompson-Boling Arena since it opened in 1987. Tennessee holds a 295-19 record at home for the past 22 years. This place is more orange than Cameron is blue, more intimidating than a den of lions.
Tennessee probably has the only women’s basketball program with a legacy and mystique around it to match the greats in men’s basketball. Any win against the team is an accomplishment. Summitt has more victories than any other Division I basketball coach, men’s or women’s, with 984. Her winning percentage with the team is a bewildering .843 during her career. And yet, the Cavaliers snatched one away from her.
Chalk this win up to a monumental performance by junior guard Monica Wright. I watched the game through an online broadcast and was astonished as her stats kept piling up. She not only put up a career-high 35 points, but she played 39 out of the game’s 40 minutes. Her five steals led the team, as did her eight rebounds — pretty impressive for a guard.
Wright’s quantity of play did not stand out alone; her quality of play was superb, too. There was great efficiency to her game. She picked up only three fouls in her 39 minutes, and she had one of the Cavaliers’ best field goal percentages, which is a nice feat for someone taking the most shots.
Is it really absurd to start talking about Wright going down as the greatest Virginia women’s basketball player of all time?
Longtime fans of the team might scoff at this. After all, the University did graduate Dawn Staley, arguably the greatest basketball player in the history of ACC basketball, men’s or women’s. Staley, whose collegiate career spanned 1989-92, is the only men’s or women’s ACC player ever to total all of 2,000 points, 700 rebounds, 700 assists and 400 steals.
But what did Staley do that Wright is unable to? All right, Staley led Virginia to three Final Fours, and Wright won’t do that, but Staley had the help of another All-American guard, Tammi Reiss. Also on those Final Four teams was Heather Burge, who now sits only behind Staley on the list of all-time leading scorers for Virginia. Wright certainly has some high-level talent around her, but nothing like what Staley had, especially since senior forward Lyndra Littles is out for the rest of the semester.
And don’t forget that Wright still can bring Virginia to the Final Four. If she plays the rest of the season like she has the past two games, she probably will. There’s no reason at this point to doubt that she’ll break Virginia’s single-season scoring record, which she came within 14 points of last year.
Staley was Naismith Player of the Year twice, but even a milestone like that isn’t out of the question for Wright, who is playing like she only just now is hitting her stride and like her ACC Rookie of the Year season in 2006-07 was an under-performance. If Wright can continue to dominate top-25 schools — and she’ll have plenty of chances to once the ACC schedule hits — she’ll be in the discussion of every player of the year award.
Even in pure stats, Wright could very well go down as the greatest Cavalier. Double all of her stats from her first two seasons, and she tops the record books in points and bests Staley in rebounds. As Wright’s defense improves, she could catch Staley in steals. Her block total, which continues to steadily grow, is also quite impressive for a guard.
The only statistic that does not astound when extrapolated through the end of Wright’s career is assists. Then again, don’t doubt Monica. You never know when she’ll rack up six assists in a key game.
And don’t forget that Wright will likely end up as captain for the Cavaliers for three seasons, that she has a smile that belongs on the cover of “People” magazine, and she’s a complete doll, one of the sweetest girls you’ll ever meet. Freshman guard Ariana Moorer said after Friday’s game against High Point that Wright is a great player but an even better person.
No matter how you look at it, Wright is a stellar player, and she showed it Monday night against the Volunteers.
I certainly don’t mean to suggest Wright did it on her own. Wright shone most brightly, but a few other stars lit up Knoxville. Center Aisha Mohammed contributed 19 points. Senior guard Britnee Millner sunk that clutch free throw that gave the Cavaliers the win and almost grabbed the rebound when she missed her second shot. Freshman guard Whitny Edwards put up her second double-digit scoring performance in as many games.
Also standing out was Virginia coach Debbie Ryan, who fits an awful lot of strength and steadiness into her small frame. She somehow convinced her team that it had a chance against the reigning national champions even though two starting Cavaliers — Littles and the injured guard Paulisha Kellum — were out.
Perhaps even Staley, in the form of karma, played a hand in the victory. An overtime loss to Tennessee in the 1991 title game prevented Staley from landing Virginia a national championship. Maybe Staley’s spirit will keep looking over this season, and Wright will pull off what no Cavalier, even Staley, has ever done and bring a title banner to Charlottesville. Virginia’s not a powerhouse yet, but ever since Sharneé Zoll first put on her orange and blue jersey in 2004, that’s where the Cavaliers have been heading, thanks to great Virginia leadership and recruiting — the team just landed the nation’s third-ranked recruiting class for 2009.
Regardless of who deserves the credit for Monday’s win, whether the game will be billed as Virginia’s coming-out party into the national spotlight or as Tennessee’s meltdown in the wake of the departure of now-WNBA stud Candace Parker, and whether Virginia carries the momentum into a successful season, Monday night’s game was a classic for the Cavaliers. Too bad I was sitting on my couch staring at a computer monitor instead of making myself hoarse in Knoxville.
Maybe I’ll go play with dry ice to make myself feel better.
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