West Chester Women's Hoops Heads To D2 NCAA Tourney
By Matt Leon
WEST CHESTER, Pa. (CBS) -- The field for the NCAA Division II Women's Basketball Tournament was announced late Sunday night and for the first time since 2012 it includes the West Chester University Golden Rams.
West Chester earned an at-large bid to this year's tourney thanks to a 24-5 record which included a loss in the championship game of the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference Tournament. The Golden Rams are the #4-seed in the Atlantic Region and they will match-up with #5-seed West Liberty University in the first round.
"It's definitely an exciting time," West Chester head coach Kiera Wooden tells KYW Newsradio. "It's one of the things we've been working for all season, so we're glad that our hard work has paid off."
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The Golden Rams have enjoyed this run in Wooden's first year as head coach. She had spent a decade as an assistant at her alma mater before taking over the program after last season when Deirdre Kane retired.
Wooden talks about what has led to her team's success.
"We are an up-tempo team," Wooden says. "We like to run, we like to press. We're exciting basketball to watch in terms of the offensive production that we usually bring to the table and if you don't have defensive weapons that can stop us offensively, we can go on runs and so on and so forth and we do enough on the defensive end to get stops. So I think combining our offensive production and our defensive intensity has helped us to that record."
The Golden Rams are led by a couple of junior guards in Dallas Ely, who scores at a clip of 14.7 points per game, and Brittany Sicinski who pours in 13.7 points a contest.
West Liberty brings a 23-8 record into the tournament. They are the champions of the Mountain East Conference. They bring a seven-game winning streak into the tournament and they can score the basketball. They are averaging 81.9 points per game.
"I think it's going to be a challenge," Wooden says. "But we are absolutely excited and up for it."
West Chester and West Liberty will tip-off on Friday, the start time has yet to be announced. The game will be played at California University of PA with the winner matching up with the winner of Cal and Virginia State in the second round.
You can follow Matt on Twitter @mattleonkyw.