Wide Right: Scribbles -- VT vs. PSU
by Jeff Cockey, 3/26/04

Well, since football is over and men’s basketball has ended its best season in quite awhile, that must mean that it is officially women’s basketball season. Actually it has been the Lady Hokies' season for quite sometime. These girls kick tail and don’t even bother to take names so I decided to visit them on ESPN in their second round match-up of the NCAA Tourney against the number-1 seeded Nittany Lions.

I’m sorry, I am just having trouble picturing Penn State as a basketball school – men’s or women’s. I was wandering home from, I am not even quite sure where, when this crazy chick (a friend of mine) pulls up next to me at 70 miles an hour on a bridge over to Florida’s barrier island. Naturally, we held a relatively involved conversation while weaving amid the traffic. I can only assume that it looked a lot like that chase scene from Bad Boys 2 with the Jamaicans and the car carrier, except that there were no Jamaicans and we were absent one car carrier. Frankly, I don’t know if anyone else was on the bridge at the time or not, but either way I was impressed that I held this type of conversation without totaling my ’91 Honda station wagon. (Would that have been so bad?)

To make a long story short, as if it’s not too late for that anyway, the upshot of this exchange was that I was to head to her house to watch Tech take on PSU. So once I got there, I was handed a pen and paper and scribbled down the game as I saw it. Most of these utterings are in chronological order but, really, is anyone going to know if I screwed up a few here or there? Didn’t think so. And away we go.

  • State wins the tip and misses the bucket.
  • We grab the board and miss a deuce. Pretty exciting thus far. But we grab the O-board and sink one for two.
  • Suddenly it’s 4-0 Tech and we seem to be rolling along very nicely.
  • Did you see Bonnie Hendrickson’s record? 158-61. Damned if that ain’t something special. Nice work Bonnie.
  • Oh we have come to the first commercial break and it is 5-4 Penn State, on our home court. And of course that means we must invoke the Under Armor oath and "protect this house!"
  • Is it me or does Penn State do nothing but shoot threes? Granted we are only like six seconds into the game but they have unleashed four threes. Everyone of them clanking off the rim but why . . . why am I complaining?
  • OK I just hit on something here. Now many of you might already know this but the ladies just downright hustle theirs cans off. It is quite fun to watch. Seems more pure than Men’s B-ball.
  • Ever wonder why they are the Lady Lions and we are the Lady Hokies and Beamer and Greenberg and the rest of the guys are not the Guy Hokies? There is so much wasted space in my head and I chose to fill it with this crap.
  • 8-7 VT and do you see how well we pass the ball? Phenomenal. Just fun to watch.
  • Check out Penn State’s coach. Is she wearing a baby blue work suit with a pair of Zack Morris white Converse high tops? Did I see that right? If so . . . I love it.
  • Our crowd is going nuts. Freakin’ nuts. Louder than any game I have ever been to at Cassell.
  • Mason for Tech on a break. Beats girls off the dribble, behind the back fake and drew the foul. It was just a really pretty play, folks.
  • This game is just Fundamentals City. Holy crap, I am having fun watching a women’s basketball game.
  • They just run and run and run. It’s like watching sprinters ‘cept a little slower and with a basketball and high tops and ponytails but other than that exactly the same.
  • Evidently Virginia Tech women’s basketball is known for our . . . whoa! Carrie Mason just drove the lane through the entire PSU team, their bench, and all of their fans. It was like a parting of the Red Sea, for a sweet lay-in bucket . . . stifling defense. Awesome defense seems to be a common theme for our school.
  • So this chick for Penn State has eleven of their sixteen points. Now, this is just me but I am guessin’ we should probably key on her from now on . . . maybe.
  • And a schweet trifecta for Carrie Mason, up in the mug of PSU’s defensive player of the year. Marvelous. If ever there was a groove, she’s all up in it.
  • Oh stuffed, we stuffed State but they still manage to go up 20-17.
  • We are playing a man defense, our corners are out on an island – come on, run on us. I dare ya.
  • Elise Woodward and Dr. Jerry Punch are announcing the game. Well hello Elise Woodward. How you doin’?
  • Carrie Mason Carrie Mason Carrie Mason. She is on fire with a three to put us down by only one.
  • Why are Penn State’s cheerleaders dressed for a snowstorm?
  • 2:40 left and we have a tie game when Kerri Gardin stuffs State. I mean just kicks her the hell out of our kitchen on a three-point attempt and takes it the length for a VT deuce.
  • Oh our stifling D with a steal and Carrie the bionic woman Mason draws another foul.
  • Halftime, 28-25 VT baby. That was the fastest half of basketball I have ever seen.
  • Not to quote Stuart Scott but boo-freakin’-ya. Is it right to get this excited about women’s basketball? Darn right it is.
  • OK. A little halftime reporting by Rece D. and Stacey Dales Schuman. Stacey loves our attacking style of play. Good for her, she obviously knows her stuff.
  • So I just saw a commercial for the movie "The Girl Next Door." Yeah right, what neighborhood do I have to live in for her to move next door? Just doesn’t happen.
  • We have to shut down Tanisha Wright of the Lady Lions. She has seventeen first half points. Seventeen! We shut her down, we roll . . . like a tootsie, baby.
  • The second half just started and State throws up a horrible shot. Really poor shot. Just ugly. Like if Roseanne Barr and the police chief from Miami Vice had a kid, ugly.
  • Hey look who’s in the crowd supporting the troops. Frankie looks dapper in his sporty gray suit.
  • Take another look at Rene Portland, Penn State’s coach. She’s wearing more mascara than Captain Jack Sparrow. "Drink up me ‘earties, yo ho."
  • VT by five. Largest lead of the night for us Hokies and there it goes. Tech by three. Then we turn it over and Tech by one, with a foul (a lame-O foul). And the game is tied at thirty-two. Let the ugliness begin.
  • So then the announcer, I am pretty sure it was Punch, exclaims that Wright for Penn State has been "unconscious" with like, roughly twelve million points.
  • Uh oh, we are starting to resemble our football team in November.
  • With ten minutes left, PSU superhero Wright has a career high 28 points. Twenty-eight points folks. I am visibly ill.
  • What happened at halftime? Where did we go? Come on ladies, you are all we’ve got left.
  • This game has just gone down the crapper. Turnover, turnover, turnover and as if we need a kick in the ribs while we are struggling to keep our head above our own flooded hell of a second half, the refs give what should have been a Hokie ball back to State.
  • 6:48 left and we are down by 15. Is there enough time left? I feel like a grilled cheese sandwich. Barb, you got any cheese?
  • I am thinking this would be a good point in the game to call another halftime.
  • If we win the first half and they win the second, do we go to penalty kicks?
  • OK so it appears that I don’t have a choice about watching our game. ESPN has decided it’s a good time to scour the nation and tell me about games that I couldn’t care less about.
  • So it seems that there is a reason Penn State is a number 1 seed.
  • OK so maybe we played like crap in the second half and maybe it wasn’t our best game and maybe the final score came out a little but not so much in our favor (61-48), but let’s overlook that for a second. Screw it. Our Lady Hokies, with one senior mind you, are playing in the NCAA Tourney beating the number one seed at one point in the second half. Hats off to you ladies. Well done. I look forward to next year.

Questions, comments, and insults are always welcome. [email protected]. 


          

Voice of the Fan Archives

TSL Home