DeLand, Fla. - The
Stetson women's basketball team (23-10) will continue its record-setting season
by making its first appearance in program history in the Women's National
Invitational Tournament (WNIT) Thursday, March 15 at Florida International
University.
STETSON'S INVITATION
The Hatters earned the Atlantic Sun Conference's automatic
WNIT spot after winning a school record 23 games and finishing second in
conference play with a 12-6 league record. Stetson will play FIU in the first
round at U.S. Century Bank Arena; should the Hatters win, they would advance to
play the winner of the Florida Atlantic at USF contest in either Boca Raton or Tampa,
Florida. That game would be
played either March 17, 18 or 19.
STETSON SERIES RESULTS
Stetson is 4-28 all-time against FIU, a member of the Sun
Belt Conference and a former powerhouse in the Trans-America Athletic
Conference, which became the Atlantic Sun Conference in 2001. The Hatters have
not faced the Golden Panthers since their last TAAC meeting January 31, 1998 in
Miami, a 72-51 victory for then 19th-ranked
FIU; their last win in the series was January 15, 1990 by a 64-60 margin at the
Edmunds Center.
This game will showcase a battle between conference MVPs as
Stetson features junior guard Victoria McGowan (Inkster, Mich.), the A-Sun
Player of the Year on the strength of her national-best three triple-doubles,
while FIU (22-10, 10-6 SBC) claims Sun Belt Player of the Year Jerica Coley, a
sophomore guard averaging 23.7 points per game and the nation's seventh-leading
scorer. In the final regular season NCAA RPI rankings released Monday, Stetson came in at 124, nine spots above FIU.
STETSON VS. WNIT FIELD
The Hatters hold a 2-1 record this season against the 2012
WNIT field, owning home wins at the Edmunds
Center over Miami
(Ohio) and
Florida Atlantic with a road loss to USF. Stetson beat the RedHawks 71-62 on
November 25 and defeated the Owls 52-37 on December 21 in the Hatter Classic;
the Hatters dropped a 77-62 decision to the Bulls on November 28 in Tampa, Fla.
THE 2012 WNIT
The WNIT is a 64-team single elimination bracket featuring
31 automatic bids going to to the highest team in each conference's standings
that did not receive a bid to the NCAA Tournament (including Stetson, Florida
Atlantic and USF) and 33 at-large selections (including FIU). Four extra at-large bids were awarded when automatic selections Auburn, North Carolina, Minnesota and USC declined their invitations. All 63 games in
the 2012 WNIT will be played on campus sites. One semifinal (March 28) and the
championship game (March 31) will be nationally televised on CBS Sports
Network.
FACEBOOK - Stetson
Athletics (facebook.com/stetsonhatters); TWITTER - @StetsonSID
(twitter.com/stetsonsid)
