{"id":54458,"date":"2017-03-13T11:34:40","date_gmt":"2017-03-13T16:34:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/?p=54458"},"modified":"2017-03-13T11:34:40","modified_gmt":"2017-03-13T16:34:40","slug":"is-uconn-good-for-womens-college-basketball","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/is-uconn-good-for-womens-college-basketball\/","title":{"rendered":"Is UConn good for women’s college basketball?"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Allie Burger<\/strong><\/p>\n

The history of the DePaul\u2019s women\u2019s basketball program can be summed up in a walk down a wide hallway on the second floor of McGrath-Phillips Arena. The corridor, linking the offices of longtime coach Doug Bruno to his assistants, is a testament to the success of one of America\u2019s premiere college programs.<\/p>\n

No inch of the wall is spared with photos of every team in the program\u2019s history covering the space and evoking memories of where they have been–21 NCAA tournaments since 1982, including the last 14 years consecutively.<\/p>\n

But DePaul is also part of a club among the NCAA women\u2019s basketball elite, a group of winning programs that duel in the shadows of the giant that is Connecticut. How much does it take away from the rest of the pack? Bruno thinks it does not, but what of women\u2019s basketball as a marketable product?<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cThe men had UCLA for a long time,\u201d Bruno said. \u201cBut the women have UConn, and UConn is different and more special than anyone else.\u201d<\/p>\n

Coach Geno Auriemma\u2019s team has won four consecutive NCAA championships and are on a 107-game winning-streak as the Huskies head into this year\u2019s tournament again as the number one seed.<\/p>\n

No other team has come close to toppling their dominance in recent years.<\/p>\n

Last spring, before the 2016 NCAA tournament, FiveThirtyEight.com did a projection of the men\u2019s and women\u2019s brackets and determined each team\u2019s chances of winning. Percentages were based in part on \u201ca composite of computer power ratings, along with how the teams were ranked by the NCAA selection committee and their rank in preseason polls.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the men\u2019s bracket, Kansas had the highest probability of 68 teams, with a 19 percent chance of winning the championship. By comparison, UConn had a 70 percent chance of winning the women\u2019s tournament.<\/p>\n

UConn\u2019s continued success has set records for women\u2019s college basketball media attention. On Feb. 13, ESPN2 aired the Huskies game against South Carolina as the program won its 100th consecutive game and according to ESPN\u2019s public relations department, it was the highest-rated college basketball game this season, among both men\u2019s and women\u2019s programming. It was also the highest-rated women\u2019s college basketball regular-season game since 2010.<\/p>\n

Though the UConn women have shined a national spotlight on a sport that is consistently under-represented in the media landscape, there has been steady discussion over the last few years that their winning record may not be good for the popularity of women\u2019s college basketball long-term.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn any sport, it\u2019s great from a competitive standpoint and from an interest standpoint to have an oligarchy as opposed to a monarchy,\u201d said ESPN.com college basketball reporter Mechelle Voepel. \u201cWhat I mean by that is if you have one team that is just so, so dominant for a long period of time, that can get frustrating. It can get old, it can lead people to sort of dismiss a sport.\u201d<\/p>\n

Voepel described the current structure of the men\u2019s bracket as a more ideal leading of multiple powers. Teams like Kansas, Duke, Kentucky and North Carolina are synonymous with being powerhouses. But not one among them is consistently the best, which keeps competition levels even and engaging.<\/p>\n

Sarah Toland, editorial director of Excelle Sports, a women\u2019s sports media company, agreed that parity draws in fans.<\/p>\n

\u201c[Women\u2019s basketball] fans feel like they know how the storyline is going to play out for the tournament,\u201d Toland said. \u201cThat discourages [them] from watching because there\u2019s not a chance for their home team, their alma mater, to advance or have a shot at the win. While it grabs the more national audience in some cases, it also alienates its traditional fan base.\u201d<\/p>\n

Others, however, believe that UConn\u2019s winning era has been vital in growing the game and improving the level of play in women\u2019s basketball. Bruno said he thinks it is the job of the other teams across the country now to rise to the standard the Huskies have set.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat UConn is doing is great for women\u2019s basketball,\u201d Bruno said. \u201cIt\u2019s our job, everybody else\u2019s job to come up to them. It\u2019s not their job to come back to us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Closing the competition gap involves a multi-part plan for programs like DePaul.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s two ways to build a program,\u201d Bruno said. \u201cGet better players or get the players you\u2019ve got better.\u201d<\/p>\n

One of Bruno\u2019s star players, Big East pre-season player of the year Jessica January, is 0-3 against UConn and said she believes eventually the playing field will \u201clevel out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Size, though, is definitely an important factor in building teams that can contend, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re just as good of a team,\u201d January said. \u201cWe have the same capabilities to play to that level, but when you have players who are all 6-2 and can play every single position, it\u2019s really hard to be a 5-6 guard and go out there and guard every single one of them.\u201d<\/p>\n

UConn\u2019s size and storyline may play out for a bit longer, but some believe the shift in power could happen sooner rather than later.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven UConn this year has shown that they have some vulnerability,\u201d Bruno said. \u201cThe rest of the pool is all tightening up. It\u2019s all getting better. The game is really in a good place and people just [need to] let the UConn factor be what it is, and look at how the programs underneath UConn this year are still really, really good.\u201d<\/p>\n

Women\u2019s basketball culture is growing in various college programs across the country. South Carolina, for example, was a \u201cnon-entity,\u201d Voepel said. Fast forward a decade, and the program has been the home attendance leader for Division I women\u2019s basketball the last two seasons and could be again this year.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s program-building from a grassroots level,\u201d Voepel said. \u201cYou have to have it building in different parts of the country, there has to be a buy-in from the fans. That\u2019s going to make people say, \u2018Oh, I don\u2019t just have to go to UConn to win a national championship. There\u2019s other opportunities.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

In the meantime, Bruno walks the hall outside his office, up above the court that was named after him, and relives the memories of players and triumphant moments that didn\u2019t quite reach the peak.<\/p>\n

He isn\u2019t alone.<\/p>\n

\u201c[UConn] has set a standard,\u201d Bruno said. \u201cLet\u2019s come up to that standard.\u201d<\/p>\n

Photo at top: DePaul prepares for the program’s 15th consecutive NCAA tournament. (Allie Burger\/MEDILL)<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Allie Burger The history of the DePaul\u2019s women\u2019s basketball program can be summed up in a walk down a wide hallway on the second floor of McGrath-Phillips Arena. The corridor, linking the offices of longtime coach Doug Bruno to his assistants, is a testament to the success of one of America\u2019s premiere college programs. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":373,"featured_media":54476,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,31,3516],"tags":[3531,3789,3808,3533,3790,3809,3807,640],"class_list":["post-54458","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general-interest","category-sports","category-winter-2017","tag-allie-burger","tag-depaul","tag-depaul-womens-basketball","tag-doug-bruno","tag-jessica-january","tag-mechelle-voepel","tag-uconn","tag-womens-basketball"],"yoast_head":"\nIs UConn good for women's college basketball? - Medill Reports Chicago<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/is-uconn-good-for-womens-college-basketball\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Is UConn good for women's college basketball? - Medill Reports Chicago\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By Allie Burger The history of the DePaul\u2019s women\u2019s basketball program can be summed up in a walk down a wide hallway on the second floor of McGrath-Phillips Arena. 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