April 16, 2011
In the end, there were tears from this courageous band of young women, too focused and invested to immediately realize just how amazing their run to the NCAA Championship’s title game was to just about everyone else paying attention.
In time they will see that they were champions, too, even if the trophy and record book will show Vanderbilt as officially the runner-up for 2011.
“We did what it took to win, we just came up a little short,” said Coach John Williamson, who regrouped his charges after the holiday break when things appeared bleak. “I told the team that what we wanted was a chance to win and we definitely had that chance. In January our goal was to simply work to make the tournament field, playing on ESPN for the national championship was not in our thought process. We are disappointed now but it is hard to be too disappointed about what these women accomplished.”
The Commodores have their galaxy of stars to be sure but they also had the least experienced team in the Final Four. And like the great thoroughbreds that thrill the racing fans at Churchill Downs, this group came from way back to make its courageous stretch run.
As a refresher, this team started the season last October by winning once and losing thrice to Alabama State and Alabama A&M. A few weeks later it was a dismal 11th at the Hawk Invitational, a tournament it had won four straight years. There were whispers that the Black and Gold were finished, a non-factor.
That’s the wonder of sport. It doesn’t matter what others think. On the eve of this championship event, Vanderbilt Coach John Williamson called a team meeting and asked each person to name something that had to happen in order for the Commodores to survive the hotly contested Friday.
One by one, the team gave its answers.
“We have to communicate well.”
“We need to stay composed in the face of challenge.”
“We need to react to changing conditions.”
“We must believe in ourselves.”
When they were finished, Williamson asked this bright group what all the factors had in common. Pausing for effect, he provided the answer. “We control everything you just said,” he said. “It’s not about them, it’s about us.”
It has always been about the team of 10, from its own team meeting early in the semester when it vowed to get its act together. And it did, promptly winning the Mid-Winter Classic and firing a warning shot to the rest of NCAA bowling that it would not go quietly into the night.
It all came together in the Motor City. There were remarkable performances in every game, usually by a different ‘Dore.
All-American Brittni Hamilton was sensational in the title game, her inclusion on the heady all-tournament team as a testament. The junior rolled 10 strikes in 12 attempts to jump start her teammates.
“After our season’s start, second place is incredible,” she said. “Right now it doesn’t seem so great but after we think about it, second place will seem more like an accomplishment.”
Sarah O’Brien, less than a month from her second hip surgery in less than a year, was also spectacular in Detroit. She not only showed physical toughness in bowling when others may have felt it was too painful to continue, the Illinois sophomore showed a gritty competitive spirit that is a prized ingredient on any team hoping to claim the first prize.
“It is difficult right now but I can still say this has been one of the greatest experiences of my life,” O’Brien said. “That is especially so with this team, we’ve overcome so much.” O’Brien admitted that as she recuperated from last October, thoughts of cheering fans and television lights were far from her mind.
“To be honest, I was just hoping to get to practice and travel with the team, I wasn’t expecting this much,” she said.
No Commodore took the title game defeat harder than anchor Samantha Hesley. It was her open frame in the tenth frame of the sixth game that opened the door for the opportunistic UMES star Maria Rodriguez to grab the fourth and final team victory.” “Sam threw a great shot in the tenth,” Williamson noted. “It just didn’t carry. She did her part, it didn’t happen and that goes with the game. Let me say this, if it were not for Sam’s tremendous play not only at this tournament but the rest of the year we wouldn’t have even been in the championship game. She is a championship player.”
There were other heroines – Kayla Rhoades, Jessica Earnest, Kim Carper, the enthusiastic “bench” – all important cogs in the Black and Gold motor.
So it ends for this team of winners. A team that stood uniformly erect during national anthems, a team that chose to attend Vanderbilt as much for academics as bowling, a team that wore “Harry” on its game jerseys in honor of a wonderful grandpa who died four months ago, a team that didn’t bother to listen to skeptics and who understood that by believing and staying together there was almost nothing it couldn’t accomplish.