Spring Break
Women's CAA Tourney predictions
Alex Falk
Issue date: 3/13/09 Section: Sports
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There will be no upsets in this bracket.
With the number one seed, the Drexel Dragons (21-8, 16-2 CAA) are the favorite to win the championship. Junior forward Gabriela Marginean has averaged 23.8 points and 7.4 rebounds per game this year, which earned her CAA Player of the Year honors.
The Dragons enter the tournament on a 13-game winning streak. The two biggest wins during the streak included a 67-55 victory over reigning league champion Old Dominion and a dramatic 74-69 overtime triumph over Virginia Commonwealth.
Drexel will play the Towson Tigers (17-12, 8-10 CAA) Friday, March 13 at noon. The Dragons defeated the Tigers 59-45 in their last game of the regular season.
If anyone can knock the Dragons off, the second-seeded Rams (25-5, 15-3 CAA) can. Senior center Quanitra Hollingsworth is one of the players that could take advantage of Drexel's lack of size inside.
VCU also was one of the only teams to give Marginean trouble. While she scored 22 points in the game, Marginean was only 3-of-16 from the field and got 14 of her points from the free throw line.
Along with Hollingsworth, senior guard/forward Radoslava Bachvarova is a weapon from behind the 3-point line and could also give the Dragons some trouble on the perimeter.
If the Rams want to capitalize on Drexel's lack of size, they will need to put pressure on Marginean early and often.
Another team that could make a run for the championship is the perennial champion Lady Monarchs (16-12, 11-7 CAA). ODU is seeded fourth in the CAA heading into the tournament. The Lady Monarchs will be trying for their 18th straight CAA women's championship.
ODU will look to senior forward Tiffany Green and junior forward Jessica Canady to put the pressure on in the paint.
While the Monarchs have defeated the Rams once earlier this year, they have also lost to them as well as the Dragons. The bad news for ODU is that all roads to the championship seem to point toward a victory over one of those two teams.
Along with those teams, the third-seeded James Madison University Dukes (21-8, 14-4 CAA) have also put together a great year, posting only four conference losses with two of those defeats coming at the hands of VCU.
The Dukes have gotten this far solely on the back of sophomore guard Dawn Evans, who averaged 23.9 points per game in the regular season. If they intend on advancing on to the later rounds of the tournament, JMU will have to hope that Evans' counterparts step up, although, they have not all season.
Prediction:
Drexel University has dominated the second half of the regular season and will look to carry that into the tournament.
The Dragons will come out on top over the VCU Rams in another thriller and advance to their first NCAA tournament in their history.
The Lady Monarchs will give Drexel University a scare in the semifinals but will come up just short and lose out on their chance for 18 in a row.
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