25-25 at half.

Aggies win, 65-56. Wickstrom definitely got her points (31), but didn't get much help from anyone else on the Highlanders.

Norris with 16 reb, but only 5 points. Sussex broke out of a slump and put in 20 pts to go with 8 rebounds and 4 assists, and Bennett provided another 19. Tegan Young with a pretty reasonable game, 9 pts and 8 reb.

Aggies only shot 35%, but made more FTs and 3s than Riverside to make up the difference.

UCSD up 24-17 over Irvine after 1Q.

It was definitely the Ryann and Avery show today. Also encouraging is how much better Sussex (AKA as “Essex” to announcer Bob Kerr) is on defense. Doubt she’ll ever be in Bennett’s class, but she’s really improved.
Tegan Young has also been playing with more confidence the last few games.

San Diego up 6 at halftime, 40-34.

Looking at the box score, one stat that sticks out is rebounds. Yes, Norris got 16, but what is really impressive is that the Aggies out-rebounded Riverside 46-31 and had 15 offensive rebounds leading to 14 second chance points. :strong:

Keep that up!

Irvine pulls to within 1 going into the 4th. 55-54 UCSD.

Irvine up 2 with 5 to go.

Tritons just tied the game up with 1:25 left.

Fouls and timeouts stage of the game; Irvine up 3.

Irvine still up 3 with 13 second left, Tritons' ball.

Irvine wins 70-68 and takes back the conference lead.

UCI 70 - UCSD 68. Aggie WBB controls their own destiny. Win out and UCD grabs at least a share of the Big West regular season championship!!

Starts with a huge game at Hawaii on Thursday. Always a really tough place to win.

GO AGS!!!

Getting a top-2 seed is the most important thing since you get the double-bye, but getting the 1 seed would be huge this year. Upsets happen, but there seems to be a clear top-3. So if you get the 1, you only have to beat 1 of the other 2 if you make the final. If you're the 2 or the 3, you'll likely have to beat both of the other good teams to make the tournament.

That definitely makes it easier to get to the Big Dance, but winning the regular season championship guarantees that a team makes the post season:

Women’s Basketball Invitational Tournament
"The regular-season champion of any NCAA Division I conference (as determined by the
conference’s tie-break protocol) not otherwise selected to the NCAA Division I Women’s
Basketball Championship will secure an automatic qualification to the Women’s Basketball
Invitation Tournament."

https://www.ncaa.com/championships/basketball-women/wbit

Women's NIT
Automatic Berths - one berth from each of the nation's 31 conferences. A team that is offered
an automatic berth by the WNIT shall be the team that is the highest-finishing team in the
conference's regular-season standings – and is not selected for the NCAA Tournament or the WBIT.

https://www.womensnit.com

March Madness is obviously preferable, but having the WBIT/WNIT already in hand means a school is playing with house money. And the chances of making a run are certainly higher in the WBIT or WNIT. UCD has never made it beyond the opening game of the NCAA Tournament, while we've twice been 3rd round or better in the WNIT (back when it was the second best option. Unfortunately, the election criteria for the WNIT, is a little dicey. Being 2nd or 3rd in the conference isn't a lock; as I read it, the WNIT committee has a weasel out option, especially if there's an upset in the conference tournament. Like if Hawaii or UCSB pulled it off.

Not sure what's better - 1 and done in the Big Dance vs. 2 or more games in one of the other tournaments? If the 1st game in the NCAA is a blowout, I'd say a win or two in one of the others is preferable.

I know the team wants to be in the NCAA but we'd likely draw a Top 10 team or even a Top 4 team with an very small chance of winning. There isn't a whole lot of parity in women's basketball and just a few teams are far and away better than all the rest. Is there a chance for a major upset, sure, but it's extremely unlikely. I'd rather see us win a few games in the WNIT than lose in a complete blowout.

My issue was that the women's team couldn't host an NIT game in probably two years, because the arena was occupied by Picnic Day activities.

Currently, College Sports Madness has Irvine as the Big West AQ as a #4 vs. Oklahoma, Autumn Johnson (NCAA site) has UCSD #4 vs. Kentucky, and Charlie Creme has UCSD as a play-in #16 vs, Cal Baptist (as a reward, the winner gets to play UCLA).

The WNIT always seems like a better draw than the NCAA