ISU earns 10-seed, sixth straight NCAA appearance

AMES - Iowa State women's basketball coach Bill Fennelly feverishly crunched the in-or-out numbers.

Cyclone guard Nikki Moody kept the faith.

Fellow guard Brynn Williamson walked into the Sukup Basketball Complex late Monday afternoon in a state of mild confusion - expecting an NCAA tournament bid, but not 100 percent certain it would come.

“You sit in the chairs and in 20 minutes you're either preparing yourself for a miracle or you're preparing yourself for a nightmare,” Williamson said.

No nightmare.

Just smiles and high fives.

ISU, a No. 10 seed, will make its sixth straight tournament appearance, playing host to seventh-seeded and 10th-ranked Green Bay at 5:30 p.m. Saturday in Hilton Coliseum.

“You don't win 30 games before the tournament even starts without being pretty dang good,” Fennelly said. “So we know what's in front of us.”

It's a rematch of sorts.

The Cyclones (18-12) held off the then-rising Phoenix (30-1) 60-56 in a 2010 second-round game.

ISU - which is 6-0 in first-round games played in Ames - was a fourth seed that season.

Green Bay, a No. 13.

The roles have reversed, but the site is the same.

“I'm sure they've got a little chip on their shoulder,” said Fennelly, whose team rebounded from an 0-5 Big 12 start to finish fourth in the league at 9-9. “I'm sure they wanted to get seeded a little higher and all that kind of stuff. And I'm sure they're not happy about coming back here again. But that's a team that was in the Sweet 16 last year.”

That's a team that has arrived - and provided a preview of its ascension to elite mid-major status in the narrow loss two years ago on the Cyclones' home floor.

“I just remember they would not go away,” said ISU forward Anna Prins who scored 13 points in that game as a freshman. “They surprised us, I think, and I think it helps this year that we know more about them just from the memories of playing them two years ago. Of course I'm excited because they have a really good post player and I love playing great players.”

The top-notch post player: slightly undersized but ultra-talented Julie Wojta.

The 6-0 senior scored 12 points in that game and scooped up Horizon League player of the year and defensive player of the year honors this season.

“When you're on a list of the top 15 players in the country and you're at a mid-major program that says you're really good,” Fennelly said.

The fact that seven of the 10 Big 12 teams received tournament berths also says a lot.

It's one of the reasons Fennelly and his players never truly felt bubble-bound.

“Honestly, the whole time I was thinking positive,” Moody said. “I just had a gut feeling we had to be in it.”