Rockne's Roundtable

great win. don't quite understand how the bracketology works here. does this guarantee we'll be in the bracket opposite baylor and with stanford instead of uconn? great to see skyler praise her teammates. go irish!

ND's record against UConn in recent years is almost incomprehensible, but what they've done this year, in particular, and they way they did it, is absolutely amazing. Even when they were up early, last night, you just knew it would go down to the wire. The key was defense, though there certainly was some timely shooting by McBride and Loyd. In the end, however, it was Skylar, being in the right place on defense, breaking down their defense with the dribble, and then the perfectly placed pass as she drew the final defender to her in the lane. There could have been no more fitting way to bring down the curtain on ND's Big East tenure.

As for the Big Dance, it will be interesting to see where UConn gets placed. Clearly Baylor has to be the #1 overall seed, and the Irish, #2. Can the committee possibly place four-loss UConn in the third slot above two-loss Stanford, the only team to have defeated Baylor? Seeding UConn fourth means they would play Baylor in the semis, absent any major hiccup for either team along the way. I think that would be the preferred scenario for the Irish.

thanks for clarifying brackets. agree we don't want uconn/baylor back to back. stanford is no slouch though. and, of course, we've got to maintain our focus. agree also that our key is defense. absolutely amazing concentration & tenacity. wish brey would buy into that formula a little.

UConn absolutely destroyed Stanford head to head. They are a much better team. They also beat #5 ranked Duke by 30 pts. They should be seeded above Stanford but it doesn't always work out that way.

The more I watch that game-winning bucket sequence, the more amazed I am with Diggins' instincts and "internal clock."

When she made the interception with about eight seconds left, it would have been easy to panic, maybe even heave a halfcourt shot, as I've seen in other different situations in other games by other teams. She has the presence of mind — and skills — to multitask by quickly peeking at the time left, dribbling through traffic and still not panicking when she almost loses control of the ball, surveying the scene around her while quickly moving forward, and instead of then trying to be the hero while putting up a desperation shot, her "internal clock" still knows there is time to pass, and her vision allows her to see Achonwa all alone underneath.

To do all that in so few seconds at the pace she did was really remarkable.

Well, I think you can make a case for either team getting the 3 seed, as we've done here. I wouldn't be surprised if ESPN got in the Committee's ears and lobbied for UConn getting the 3 to increase the probability of a Round 4 between these ND & UConn,, though they might prefer a scenario that makes an ND - Baylor final, with the sport's two marquee players, more likely. Plenty of tough games remain, however, before any of that becomes a reality.

Nearly fifty years ago, Pulitzer Prize winning author, John McPhee wrote a New Yorker profile of Bill Bradley, titled, "A Sense of Where You Are." It was a beautiful piece of writing which described Bradley's many skills, both on and off the court, but particularly emphasized his remarkable vision and court sense. He was far from being the fastest or best leaper any time he stepped on the court, but he had an uncanny instinct for being in the right place at the right time. Many of the great ones had finely honed instincts which allowed their level of play to transcend their physical gifts. The comment about Joe Montana comes to mind, when someone described him as having the ability to see the game in slow motion. Skylar Diggins is uniquely talented, though she may be no better than the third best pure shooter on the ND team. However, the scope of all her physical skills has remarkable breadth, and the sum of them is exceeded by the whole of what she brings to the floor every game. Like Bradley, who was one of the greatest college players of his era, her instincts and court presence are not quantifiable, but simply extraordinary.