Main goal still ahead for Lady Tigers

• By WILLIAM WEATHERS
• Advocate sportswriter
• Published: Mar 16, 2008 - UPDATED: 11:25 a.m.

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First-year LSU women’s basketball coach Van Chancellor attempted to ease the sting somewhat, trying to prop up his dejected team with some perspective in the moments after last Sunday’s 61-55 loss to Tennessee in the championship game of the Southeastern Conference tournament.

Before the Lady Tigers departed their locker room Chancellor reminded them that achieving a national championship wasn’t contingent upon the outcome of the SEC’s tournament title game.

Chancellor only needed to look back a year ago when Tennessee, which was ousted by LSU in the tournament’s semifinal round, responded with six consecutive victories in the NCAA tournament to win the school’s seventh national crown.

“As a program, we’re disappointed to lose the SEC tournament championship,” LSU senior point guard Erica White said. “That wasn’t our goal at the beginning of the season. Our goal is to win a national championship. The SEC tournament would have been icing on the cake along the way. We’ve got a bigger goal in mind and we’re focused on that.”

Sixth-ranked LSU (27-5) begins that process Saturday when the Lady Tigers host the first and second rounds of the NCAA tournament at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center.

With its destination for the first and second rounds already decided, the Lady Tigers will have the following blanks filled in Monday when the Division I Women’s Selection Committee unveils its 64-team bracket at 6 p.m. on ESPN:

• What will they be seeded.

• Whom will be their first-round opponent.

• What other seven teams are headed to Baton Rouge

• What region — Greensboro, N.C., New Orleans, Oklahoma City or Spokane, Wash. — will host them.

“There are more good teams that can get to the Final Four than there’s ever been in the history of women’s basketball,” Chancellor said. “I keep telling our team that every possession’s going to count and Tennessee was an indication of that.”

LSU will make its 18th appearance in the NCAA tournament and eight straight. The Lady Tigers will host their first tournament games since 2004 where they launched the first of the program’s four straight trips to the Final Four.

“It’s going to be interesting to see,” LSU All-American center Sylvia Fowles said. “For the most part I’m just happy we still a have chance to compete and I’m looking forward to that.”

LSU, the SEC’s regular-season champion, returned to practice Wednesday after two days off.

The Lady Tigers had reached their fourth straight championship game, and for the fourth consecutive time LSU left wondering what might have been.

After losing a 54-51 lead with more than three minutes to play, the Lady Tigers managed only one point over the remainder of the game — spanning eight possessions.

The loss was their second in 18 games.