Tougher than expected

TRENTON, N.J. - The UConn women's basketball team won 77-53 against No. 4-seeded California Sunday afternoon to advance to its 15th Elite Eight appearance in 17 seasons.

But win No. 36 was by no means as easy as the score would suggest.

UConn scored the first basket of the game in eight seconds. After falling behind, it took 14:42 to regain the lead for the first time.

Unlike so many other games for the Huskies, the Golden Bears prevented the team from breaking away, effectively executing defense and leading for much of the first half. Renee Montgomery, who in games has often taken it upon herself to lead the team through struggles, was held to just five points and shot just 2-for-11 from the floor.

"The problems were that we were, we're more missing shots," Montgomery said. "We did get a few open shots in the beginning and we weren't knocking them down, so it was one and done. And then, we were shooting the ball off of one pass and we were trying to create our own shots and pretty much we were trying to make a 10-point comeback in one play. And it wasn't working."

In addition, Tina Charles got into early foul trouble, getting two in the first five minutes. She spent the rest of the first half watching from the bench.

"It's one of those things that, you know, you've got to remember…we've practiced all year and [head] Coach [Geno Auriemma] puts us in situations in practice where we're done, we have a disadvantage, or some sort of, you know, obstacle that we have to get by in a drill or something," said Maya Moore.

As a result, Kaili McLaren became one of the key elements to determining how the rest of the game would play out. Without her, the team could not have succeeded, Moore said.

With Montgomery's early struggles and Charles's absence in the post, Cal exploited the opportunity. The Golden Bears scored 21 of their 33 points either from the perimeter or at the free-throw line.

It was the challenge to UConn in those two areas that Auriemma said he told the team would create problems. Non other than Wade Trophy and All-American finalist Ashley Walker was UConn's nightmare.

In the first 14 minutes, Walker had 16 points.

"She's a great player and she is obviously one of the leaders of that team," Moore said. "…When I was guarding her, or Kalana [Greene] or Tina, just trying to force her to stay off the right side and force her to shoot jump shots. But she's very active and she has the ability to play inside and out."

With six minutes and 39 seconds remaining in the first, head coach Geno Auriemma called a timeout. The Huskies were down by eight - the largest deficit of the season for the team. Three minutes later, after substituting Lorin Dixon for Greene, the Huskies were up by one.

Auriemma said that the move to substitute Dixon was a way for him to settle down his team's frenetic pace. Dixon, he said, is a passer and creates opportunities.

"I don't know that we reacted as well as I would have liked early in the first half," he said. "But as time went on, I thought our true character of this team started to come out. I loved the way we handled…the game the second half. I thought it was classic Connecticut basketball."

Cal head coach Joann Boyle said that the team's lack of depth required her to execute a triangle and two on Montgomery and Maya Moore. That left Tiffany Hayes open, who scored a career-high 28 points in the win.

As the teams headed to the locker room, UConn was up 35-33. Ultimately, though, the nail in the coffin that led to a 12-2 run spanning the end of the first and into the opening minutes of the second was Natasha Vital's second foul. That took away one of the playmakers for the Golden Bears.

"… I was really happy to see the way my teammates and I just didn't panic," Moore said. "We were confident, we were calm, you know. We knew we had to fix a few things and we knew another run was going to come."

Less than five minutes into the second half, the Huskies were up by 10. From that point on, they never looked back, going on a 37-12 run spanning nearly 20 minutes.

As the minutes dwindled down to seconds, some players cracked smiles. Auriemma applauded his team's efforts on the sidelines.

"We would love to play like that all the time," he said. "I think Cal presents a huge problem that if you get overextended, then if those few guys are allowed to run wild in the lane, we already had a couple guys in foul trouble. So we had to kind of pick our spots. But sometimes the best way to keep the ball out of the post, the best way to defend post players is by really getting after their guards."

"I wish we could do more of that, but we don't have enough bodies to be able to do that," he said. "…We've got to win it with our half court, man-to-man defense. Put your hand up and hope they miss."

Brittany - women's bball brief preview/ASU Texas A&M game recap

TRENTON, N.J. - It was another day of upsets in the NCAA tournament, at least for one team.

The Sun Devils played a back-and-forth game against the Aggies Sunday afternoon in the second game at Trenton. Despite the fact that they were the lower seed, they only trailed for the first 29 seconds of the game and shot 66 percent in the first half.

ASU broke out in the closing minutes of the game, pulling up the upset of the No.2 seed Texas A&M in the Trenton Regional, winning 84-69.

As the Sun Devils took their final free throws, ASU head coach Charli Turner Thorne went down the line high-fiving her players.

"I'm a little bit speechless, to be honest, and that doesn't happen very often," Turner Thorne said. "Just overwhelming pride….usually we don't win giving up 69 points."

Briann January scored 22 points in 24 minutes, while Danielle Orsillo.

The win is the second for the Devils in the Sweet Sixteen in 26 years. ASU has advanced once before to the Elite Eight, in 2007, where it lost defeated Bowling Green, 67-49. The team lost to Rutgers in th