What to know about Kentucky’s storyline-filled NCAA women’s basketball tournament pod
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Women’s NCAA Tournament: Previewing Kentucky vs. Princeton
Click below to view more content from the Lexington Herald-Leader and Kentucky.com previewing Kentucky’s women’s basketball matchup against Princeton on Saturday afternoon in the NCAA Bridgeport Regional at Bloomington, Ind.
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Even a Hollywood scriptwriter couldn’t have packed more storylines into Kentucky women’s basketball’s NCAA Tournament pod.
The Wildcats will be a No. 6 seed in the 2022 NCAA Tournament, playing first- and second-round games at Assembly Hall in Bloomington, Indiana, this weekend.
Joining UK in the four-team Bloomington pod is No. 3 Indiana (the host school), No. 11 Princeton and No. 14 Charlotte.
The Bloomington pod is part of the larger Bridgeport (Connecticut) Region.
UK will play Princeton at about 4 p.m. Saturday. The game will air on ESPN.
Before that, Indiana and Charlotte will play at 1:30 p.m. Saturday. The game will air on ESPN2.
The winners of those games will meet in the round of 32 on Monday at a time yet to be announced.
This grouping gives Kentucky a first-round game against a team it played in the NCAA Tournament just three years ago.
Additionally, potential second-round games for UK would be against either an old rival that UK has already played this season with a Kentuckian as one of its star players, or against a team featuring two former UK players from last season.
Here’s what you need to know about the three other teams joining Kentucky in Bloomington for the NCAA women’s basketball Tournament.
No. 11 seed Princeton Tigers (24-4)
Let’s begin with the team Kentucky is guaranteed to play against.
Kentucky and Princeton played in these exact same circumstances in 2019: Kentucky was the No. 6 seed, Princeton was the No. 11 seed and the teams met in the round of 64.
Kentucky won that game, 82-77, which came during Rhyne Howard’s freshman season. Howard had 15 points, five rebounds and four assists in the UK win, which came before the Wildcats were eliminated by North Carolina State in the round of 32.
Now, Howard is a star senior guard playing her final games as a UK player.
“It will just add a lot of fun to the games, a lot more fun,” Howard said of the familiarity with UK’s early-round opponents. “We played Princeton my freshman year, so just for it to come back full circle is like, ‘Wow.’”
This year’s Princeton team reached the NCAA Tournament as champions of the Ivy League, both in the regular season and in the postseason tournament.
The Tigers went 14-0 in regular-season Ivy League play, marking consecutive seasons dating back to 2019-20 that Princeton has compiled a perfect record in conference play.
The Ivy League canceled winter sports last season.
The Tigers won a pair of games in the Ivy League Tournament last weekend over Harvard, 72-67, and Columbia, 77-59, in the championship game.
Princeton hasn’t lost in 2022, as the Tigers have won 17 straight games. Princeton’s last defeat came on Dec. 22 at home against Texas.
In Monday’s Associated Press Top 25 poll — the last one to be released before the NCAA Tournament begins — Princeton checked in at No. 25 in the country.
This year marks Princeton’s ninth NCAA Tournament appearance, and third consecutive as the Ivy League’s automatic qualifier: Princeton has won the last three Ivy League Tournaments contested in 2018, 2019 and this year.
Three players average double-digit scoring for Princeton: Senior guard Abby Meyers (17.8 points per game), junior guard Julia Cunningham (13.5) and sophomore guard Kaitlyn Chen (10.3).
Chen had a career-high 30 points in the Ivy League Tournament championship game win over Columbia
Sophomore forward Ellie Mitchell averages more than 10 rebounds per game for the Tigers.
Princeton boasts one of the best defenses in the country: The Tigers allow just 50.9 points per game, the third-lowest amount in the nation, and opponents shoot just 34.9% from the field against Princeton.
Turnover margin has also been a big part of Princeton’s success: The Tigers commit less than 14 turnovers per game while forcing more than 19 turnovers by opponents.
Kentucky averages 72.5 points per game and will take a 10-game win streak into Saturday’s meeting.
Something has to give.
No. 3 seed Indiana Hoosiers (22-8)
Should Kentucky and Indiana meet in the round of 32 on Monday, it would be the third time in 16 months that the Wildcats and Hoosiers play on the hardwood.
UK erased a 14-point deficit in December 2020 to beat IU in Lexington. In November 2021, Indiana won convincingly, 88-67, in Bloomington.
The potential for a postseason rubber match is tantalizing.
Indiana reached new heights as a program this season in various polls and rankings, but there was no hardware to match the progress.
After leading in the Big Ten regular season standings, the Hoosiers lost four of their final five regular-season games to miss out on the conference title. In the Big Ten Tournament, Indiana lost in the championship game to Iowa.
All five Indiana starters average double-digit scoring: Guards Grace Berger (16.3 points per game), Ali Patberg (11.8) and Nicole Cardaño-Hillary (11.7), along with forwards Mackenzie Holmes (15.5) and Aleksa Gulbe (12).
Berger is a Kentucky native who was a high school star in Louisville at Sacred Heart Academy. As a high school senior in 2018, Berger was named a Kentucky All-Star and was a finalist for Miss Basketball.
Holmes dominated Kentucky earlier this season, scoring 13 first-quarter points and leading all players in that November game with 29 points.
Holmes missed eight games this season for Indiana due to a knee injury that required surgery, but has started and played at least 23 minutes in each of IU’s last eight games. She leads Indiana with an average of seven rebounds per game.
On Sunday night, the Herald-Leader asked Kentucky’s Rhyne Howard about the possibility of a round-of-32 rematch with the Hoosiers in Bloomington.
“Oh, we are going to win. If we get there, we’re going to win,” Howard said. “It’s as simple as that.”
No. 14 seed Charlotte 49ers (22-9)
Should an upset occur in Saturday’s first game — and assuming Kentucky holds serve in its matchup with Princeton — then the Wildcats would face Conference USA champion Charlotte in the round of 32 on Monday.
The 49ers started the season 1-4 but have had a strong 2022 after three games were postponed in late December and early January.
Charlotte has gone 18-3 in games played this year, which have all been against C-USA opponents. This includes a three-game run to the C-USA Tournament title last weekend, as Charlotte won those games by a combined 14 points.
The 49ers trailed by as many as 15 points, but still rallied to beat Louisiana Tech in the C-USA championship game, 68-63.
This is Charlotte’s third all-time appearance in the NCAA Tournament, and the first since 2009. The 49ers have never won a game in the NCAA Tournament.
Charlotte is led in scoring by fifth-year guard Octavia Jett-Wilson, who averages more than 19 points per game and has 15 games this season of 20 points or more. Jett-Wilson was named the C-USA Player of the Year.
Redshirt senior guard Mikayla Boykin averages 13.3 points per game
Two names on the Charlotte roster will stick out to Kentucky fans: KeKe McKinney and Kameron Roach.
McKinney, a fifth-year forward, spent four seasons at Kentucky and started 94 games in her UK career.
McKinney was UK’s team leader in blocks last season.
This season with the 49ers, McKinney has started all 31 games and averages more than 32 minutes played per contest. She leads Charlotte in rebounding by averaging more than eight rebounds per game, and in blocks with 71.
McKinney, who ranks 21st in the nation in blocked shots per game, was named the C-USA Defensive Player of the Year. McKinney will have to be at her best on Saturday to help Charlotte contain Indiana’s strong inside presence.
Roach, a redshirt senior guard, also spent four season at Kentucky, but didn’t play in the 2019-20 season due to an injury and received a medical redshirt.
Roach played sparingly at UK and made one start and appeared in eight games for the Wildcats last season.
This season with the 49ers, Roach has played in 24 games while making one start. She averages nearly 12 minutes played per game, although boosting that stat is a quadruple-overtime game against Rice when Roach played 42 minutes.
Last season, Roach went through Senior Day ceremonies for UK, while McKinney didn’t.
UK had announced in February 2021 that McKinney planned to play for the Wildcats this season while pursuing a master’s degree, but McKinney announced in April that she would be transferring elsewhere for her final season of college basketball.
McKinney announced later in April that she would be going to Charlotte, just days after Roach did the same.
Other top teams in the Bridgeport Region
Whichever team advances out of the Bloomington pod will advance to the Sweet 16 and then possibly the Elite Eight, with those two rounds of games to be played at Total Mortgage Arena in Bridgeport, Connecticut.
Among the other teams in the region hoping to make it to Bridgeport are:
No. 1 seed North Carolina State (29-3).
The top seed in the region, N.C. State won the Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament for the third straight season.
N.C. State won both the ACC regular season and tournament titles this season. Senior center Elissa Cunane (13.8 points and 7.7 rebounds per game) is projected to be a top-five pick in next month’s WNBA Draft.
No. 2 seed Connecticut (25-5).
The Huskies had more up-and-down moments than they’re accustomed to, but the postseason begins with Geno Auriemma’s team hosting first- and second-round games in Storrs, with the promise of more de facto home games to come in Bridgeport. Connecticut won the Big East Tournament, which was also played in Connecticut.
Star sophomore guard Paige Bueckers is back for the Huskies after having surgery on her left knee in December, having played limited minutes in Connecticut’s last five games.
No. 4 seed Oklahoma (24-8).
Oklahoma is in the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2018.
Jennie Baranczyk set an OU record this season for wins by a first-year head coach with 24.
The Sooners finished in fourth place in the Big 12 Conference and made a 12-game improvement from last season. OU will host first- and second-round games in Norman, Oklahoma.
No. 5 seed Notre Dame (22-8).
Second-year head coach Niele Ivey has taken the Fighting Irish back to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since Notre Dame finished as the national runner-up in 2019.
Ivey’s son, Jaden, is a star sophomore guard at Purdue and a projected lottery pick in this summer’s NBA Draft.
Only two players on the Notre Dame roster have prior NCAA Tournament experience. Notre Dame will play opening-round games in Norman, Oklahoma.
Saturday
No. 6 Kentucky vs. No. 11 Princeton
What: NCAA Tournament round of 64
When: About 4 p.m.
Where: Assembly Hall in Bloomington, Ind.
TV: ESPN
This story was originally published March 16, 2022 at 6:30 AM.
