BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — The players on the Texas bench literally had to be held back from spilling onto the floor. Bryanna Preston twisted back and forth in a dance. Jordan Lee pretended to spoon food into her mouth. Aaliyah Moore faux-fainted and had to be held up by teammates.
The Longhorns’ 6-foot-6 backup center, Kyla Oldacre, had just stolen the ball near the opposite three-point line, drove three quarters of the court to the basket and finished with an and-one layup while crashing to the floor. Throngs of fans wearing burnt orange behind the bench leaped. The ensuing free throw gave the Longhorns their biggest lead of the night at 11 points in the fourth quarter.
It was enough to hold off a late TCU rally and send Texas back to the Final Four for the first time since 2003 with a 58-47 victory in the Birmingham Region 3 final Monday night.
Texas Coach Vic Schaefer said he walks past a banner for that 2003 Final Four run every day.
“When I took the job five years ago, that was something I understood was on their mind,” Schaefer said, “and it’s something that’s been on my mind. It obsesses me. You’re obsessed with it.
“I knew this team was good enough. I’ve been trying to tell them for five months they’re good enough. To see it come to fruition for them, it’s what it’s all about for me, to see the joy on their face.”
The Longhorns, who leaned on their defense to reach the sport’s biggest stage, will face defending champion South Carolina in a national semifinal Friday night in Tampa.
The Longhorns seemed to be the least talked about No. 1 seed in the NCAA women’s tournament. Madison Booker is a two-time all-American, but she doesn’t get the attention that players such as USC’s JuJu Watkins or UCLA’s Lauren Betts have received this season. South Carolina is about to play in its fifth consecutive Final Four, so there is no shortage of attention there, either. Still, Texas tied with South Carolina as regular season champions in the SEC and has just three losses all season. The Longhorns belong.
Booker was named the region’s most outstanding player after posting 18 points and six rebounds Monday. She was joined by teammate Rori Harmon (13 points, five assists, two steals) on the all-region team.
Harmon was in tears after the game, reminiscing about tearing her ACL on Dec. 27, 2023, and finally being cleared to play Oct. 17, 2024, before logging every game this season.
“I just think about going through my recovery and coming back after 10 months,” Harmon said on the ESPN broadcast with Booker’s arm around her shoulders. “I’m so proud of myself, and I’m so proud of my team to get to this moment.”
The Longhorns are going to their fourth Final Four, with their lone previous national championship and national final appearance coming in 1986. Schaefer heads to his third Final Four after taking Mississippi State to the championship game in 2017 and 2018.
The historic run for TCU — which made its first Elite Eight in school history — ended in less-than-fantastic fashion after its two stars, Hailey Van Lith and Sedona Prince, were hounded throughout the night. Van Lith, the only player to reach Elite Eights with three different teams in the men’s or women’s tournament, finished with 17 points, eight rebounds, two assists and seven turnovers while shooting 3 for 15 from the field. Prince fouled out with four points and nine rebounds.
“It’s been certainly a journey and nothing I expected,” Van Lith said. “It was hard. It was a lot of nights of being like, ‘I feel like God has put this thing on my heart to be great, but it’s not working out right now.’ A lot of times, I had to look at myself in the mirror and just be like: ‘What do you want, Hailey? Who are you?’ And I’m grateful for it.”
Texas came into the game ranked 18th in the nation in both scoring defense (55.9 points allowed per game) and forced turnovers per game (just under 21), and it relied on that defense again to hold a TCU team that had the No. 23 scoring offense in the country to a season low and 30.5 points under its average.
Little was pretty anywhere on the floor early on as the two teams combined to shoot 1 for 11 from the field to start the game. The question was: Were they just tight, or was it exquisite defense? Texas quickly answered as it began forcing turnovers with a full-court press that frazzled TCU and turned those giveaways into baskets. In the first quarter alone, the Longhorns essentially forced two shot clock violations, two 10-second violations and a five-second inbound violation, and Harmon turned two steals into layups. TCU had 21 turnovers on the night that were converted into 17 Texas points.
“We’re always going to play hard, no matter the circumstance,” Harmon said. “I Just want everyone to understand this is what Texas is about and it’s not going to change.”
An 8-3 second-quarter spurt put TCU in a nine-point hole, and the Horned Frogs seemed in serious trouble as their offensive woes continued and Van Lith and Prince were locked up. That was the case until they were able to close the half on a 7-0 run, including a corner three and a buzzer-beating fadeaway from Van Lith to send the teams into halftime with Texas leading 23-21.
“They’re the greatest team in TCU women’s basketball history,” TCU Coach Mark Campbell said. “It just shows when you come together and you lose yourself in the journey and you set your ego aside just the incredible things you can accomplish.”
Texas’s defense still made life difficult after the break, and the Longhorns closed the third quarter with a 13-4 run after being tied at 29-29. A late push got TCU within six points, but the Longhorns didn’t give up another point in the final 2:41.
