Former Notre Dame standout and Pepperdine teammate take on
powerful Sooners in first-round action
It didn’t become official until the Pepperdine Waves women’s basketball team beat Santa Clara 71-67 in the WCC Tournament title game two weeks ago, but guard Jessica Ross recalls the moment she knew her team would get to the Big Dance.
It was just after a heartbreaking loss at the end of January. The Waves, which started the season 1-6, had just lost to Loyola-Marymount at the buzzer on their home floor for their third loss in a row. After the game, Pepperdine head coach Julie Rousseau made a bold statement to her team.
“Our coach was like, ‘We’re gonna win the tournament, we’re going to the dance,'” said Ross, the Gilroy native who starred at Notre Dame and now starts for the Waves.
Pepperdine did improve and two weeks ago, the 14-16 team turned the dream into a reality by making an improbable run to win the WCC Tournament and clinch an automatic bid into the NCAA Tournament. The Waves received a No. 15 seed in the Boston Regional and will tip-off against No. 2 Oklahoma (29-4) today at 10am at Denver’s Pepsi Center.
“We’re still growing and have a ton of potential,” said Ross, who scored 14 points in the WCC title game.
Going into the tournament, Pepperdine couldn’t be a bigger Cinderella hopeful. The Waves squad is the only team – men’s or women’s – to make it into the NCAA Tournament with a losing record. Since Rousseau’s speech following the Loyola-Marymount game, Pepperdine has won eight of its last ten games.
“We’re super excited. It’s what we were just working for all season,” said Ross in a phone interview from Denver Thursday night. “It’s always (a dream). In college basketball, you think NCAA Tournament. It is kind of living dream, being here.”
Ross said the team watched Monday’s live selection show on ESPN in Malibu from the Pepperdine cafeteria where a big screen television had been set up for the occasion. Fans, student athletes from other sports and Pepperdine faculty members joined the women’s team to find out where it would play. Since the Waves already knew they were in the tournament, it was just a matter of finding out who they would play.
“I don’t think we could have got in a better position,” Ross said about the No. 15 seeding.
Pulling off an upset of the Sooners, who fell to Duke in the NCAA Championship final in 2002, will not be an easy task for Pepperdine. A big reason is another Californian, former Piedmont star and freshman forward center Courtney Paris, who is averaging 21.4 points per game. The 6-foot-4 Paris, daughter of former San Francisco 49er Bubba Paris, is leading the country in rebounds per game (15.1) and needs just 38 more to set the NCAA record for rebounds in a season. Courtney’s twin sister Ashley also plays for the Sooners.
Rousseau addressed the matchup with Courtney Paris in Thursday’s press conference in Denver, jokingly asking, “Does any one have any ideas on how to stop Courtney Paris?”
Ross, whose Notre Dame team lost to Piedmont in the NorCal Tournament her sophomore and senior seasons, is also quite familiar with both Paris twins’ abilities.
“I played against them in AAU when I was younger,” Ross said. “I’m excited. It’s kind of funny because I remember seeing them in fifth grade and here we are. It’s kind of a small world.”
Pepperdine has little NCAA Tournament experience on the court, but plenty on the bench. Senior forward Kelsey Ball is the only player with NCAA Tournament experience from when the Waves made the tournament in 2003. But head coach Rousseau (as an assistant coach at Stanford) and assistants Vanessa Nygaard (as a player at Stanford) and Shelley Sheetz (as a player at Colorado) have all had experience at the Big Dance.
Pepperdine’s top two leading scorers are 5-foot-7 sophomore guard Daphanie Kennedy (12 ppg) and 6-foot-1 junior forward Jasmane Clarendon (11.5 ppg, 6.9 rpg)
“We just have to come in with confidence,” said Ross of the guidance the coaches have been providing their players. “We have a right to be here, we belong here and we just have to come in and play hard.”
Win or lose Saturday, Ross will be left with good memories of the Waves’ run for the WCC Tournament title and the NCAA Tournament
“It’s just so much work and so much fun,” Ross said. “To get to spend time with my teammates and this is the payoff. I can’t wait to play.”
