ORONO
The University of Maine women’s basketball team will face the University of Texas in Austin, Texas, in the first round of the NCAA tournament at 6 p.m. Saturday.
The 23-9 Black Bears, winners of 14 of their last 15 and six in a row, earned their first NCAA berth since 2004 by beating Hartford 74-65 in the America East final.
Texas (26-6) earned a No. 2 seed while the Black Bears are a No. 15 seed. They will play in the Frank C. Erwin Jr. Center which holds 16,540 fans.
It is the Black Bears’ eighth NCAA tournament appearance.
The Longhorns are 14-2 at the Erwin Center this season, their only losses coming to No. 1 Connecticut 75-71 on Jan. 15 and to No. 3 Baylor (93-87) on Feb. 19.
The winner plays the winner of the 3:30 p.m. game between seventh seed Arizona State (21-12) and 10th seed Nebraska (21-10) on Sunday.
There was a large throng on hand at the Alfond Family Lounge at Alfond Arena to watch the NCAA tournament selection show.
“I’m looking forward to it. It’s going to be a great experience,” said UMaine junior guard Tanesha Sutton. “It’s a good opportunity. It’s a new environment. We’re going to play hard.”
“We’ve already played a lot of good teams,” said sophomore forward Fanny Wadling. “We believe in ourselves. We’ll give it a good shot.”
UMaine has played four NCAA tournament teams this season.
Mississippi State is a No. 1 seed, Ohio State is a No. 3 seed, former UMaine head coach Joanne P. McCallie’s Duke team is a No. 5 seed and Miami (Florida) earned a No. 8 seed.
UMaine lost all four contests.
UMaine did play Texas on Dec. 29, 1992, in the Bell Atlantic Tournament in Piscataway, New Jersey, and lost 72-34.
Millan said she was surprised that they are going to Texas.
“We thought we were going to Tallahassee (Florida State) or Tennessee,” said Millan.
Texas lost to Baylor 77- 69 in the Big 12 final eight days ago after beating Iowa State 81-69 in the quarterfinals and West Virginia 68-55 in the semis in Oklahoma City.
The 5-foot-4 McCarty is one of four Longhorns averaging double figures at 13.9 points per game.
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