Tech, Georgia excited to play in NCAA Women’s Tournament

Both Georgia Tech and Georgia are heading into familiar territory in the NCAA women’s tournament — but Tech heads to a familiar away court while the Bulldogs will play host.

Eleventh seed Georgia (18-13, 7-7 SEC) will be at the Gwinnett Arena in Duluth, where they’ll take on No. 6 seed Arizona State (23-8, 15-3 PAC-10) in the Trenton Regional at noon Saturday.

Georgia coach Andy Landers said the Sun Devils may be traveling to a road game, but he doesn’t expect them to be play like it.

“Arizona State is a team that literally subs five in and five out,” Landers said. “They play a lot of people a lot of minutes.”

The Bulldogs are 1-3 against the Sun Devils overall. Arizona State won the last meeting 57-67 in 2005.

Georgia, which struggled some during the season, wasn’t a shoo-in for the tournament and didn’t get their name called until late Monday night.

“We played ourselves onto a small bubble,” Landers said. “And we knew that we had a chance to get in and a chance to be left out.”

But the tournament is a new season, and Georgia, which made the tournament field for the 26th time in 28 years, it’s in an arena full of hometown fans.

“We are definitely grateful,” said junior guard Ashley Houts. “Especially playing in front of the home crowd. I feel that’s going to be a big advantage. We are definitely excited about that.”

The Yellow Jackets (21-9, 8-6 ACC) are once again heading to Iowa to play an Iowa team. Last year, in the first round of the tournament, they lost to Iowa State in Des Moines.

This year, the ninth-seeded Yellow Jackets play the eighth-seeded University of Iowa (21-10, 13-5 Big Ten) at the Carver-Hawkeye Arena in Iowa City in the Oklahoma City Regional at 9:30 p.m Sunday.

While it is a road game, they do feel comfortable in Iowa. Tech beat the Hawkeyes 76-57 there last season in the ACC-Big Ten challenge. That was the only meeting between the two teams.

“We are very familiar with this team,” Tech coach MaChelle Joseph said. “It’s basically the same five starters we played against, with the exception of one.”

Tech forward junior Brigitte Ardossi says Tech has experience in playing big road games, and their history in Iowa helps.

“We played UConn on their home court, we’ve played a lot of games away that bring big crowds in,” she said. “We’ve been to Iowa before, so why not again? It’s our second home in the NCAA tournament.”

Both Georgia and Tech’s conferences will be well represented in the tournament.

The ACC is sending six teams to the tournament, including No. 1 seeds Duke and Maryland. The SEC is sending seven teams.

The undefeated Connecticut Huskies earned the No. 1 overall seed in the NCAA women’s basketball tournament and will open against Vermont on Sunday at Storrs.

Oklahoma, Maryland, and Duke earned the other three No. 1 seeds.

If Tech wins, it could meet top-seeded Oklahoma in the second round.

Tennessee also extended its run as the only team to make every NCAA tournament but earned a No. 5 — its lowest seed ever, guaranteeing a tough road to a third consecutive title.

The Final Four is scheduled for the Scottrade Center in St. Louis on April 5 and 7.