Early on in Conference play I wrote this piece on my blog analyzing how Coach June Daugherty was using the underclassmen at that point in the season. For those of you who are not inclined to go take a look at what I wrote; I concluded that Daugherty had decided that this season was about developing the underclassmen and focusing on the overall future of the program, not winning this season.

This young team had shown its youth throughout the early part of the season, they lost games they probably shouldn’t have lost (at Minnesota, vs. Wisconsin) and won games they probably shouldn’t have won (at Gonzaga, vs. #20 Ohio State). That being said, something changed in the second half of their game in Seattle against UW. The team began to look like a team that was Coached by June and Mike Daugherty.

As a result, the Cougs proceeded to go 5-8 down the stretch in conference play (this includes the Conference tournament); and only two of those games was clearly out of reach from the opening tip (both were vs. Stanford). They produced a four game win streak, secured the programs fourth ever victory in the conference tournament, and ended multi-year losing streaks to the Arizona schools.

It was an impressive season for the Women’s basketball squad and it was driven by their nine underclassmen (three sophomores, and six freshmen):