Call them what you will.
Great expectations. Lofty goals. The "new heights" they have been waiting to reach.
But no matter the words, one thing is for certain: the No. 8 Penn State women's basketball team has an entirely straightforward plan for the season.
"If we don't make it to the Final Four, we didn't do our job," senior guard Kelly Mazzante said.
"We're just talking Final Four," junior guard Jess Strom said.
But the players didn't even need to say it. The Lady Lions' schedule and a copy of the pre-season USA Today/ESPN Coaches Poll say it for them.
The squad's home opener: No. 10 LSU. Potential opponent at the Junkanoo Jam tournament in the Bahamas: No. 5 Kansas State. The second home game: No. 3 Texas. A Dec. 21 home matchup: No. 12 Louisiana Tech. The final pre-conference season game: No. 14 North Carolina.
Clearly, the women aren't looking to pad their record with a fluffy non-conference schedule. The goal isn't to play teams that will allow them to coast to an easy 10 wins before the commencement of the Big Ten season. They are looking to see, right away, just how they match up against the nation's best women's basketball programs -- because come April, they want to be among the nation's best.
The Lady Lions' record may very well be sacrificed with this decision. Five Top 25 teams in the early weeks of the season would by no means be easy for any team. But this is especially true for Penn State, as it still has a lot to figure out -- namely its post play.
Penn State women's basketball coach Rene Portland has indicated that until the team feels more comfortable on the inside, they will be sticking to last season's four-guard showcase. With four experienced and talented guards that used this configuration to win the 2003 Big Ten Championship, it is clear that this game plan can work well.
But against the top teams in the country, it will not work well enough, and nowhere was this more definitively proven than last season in the squad's Sweet 16 loss to Tennessee. The Lady Lions were totally dominated in the paint, as they were out-rebounded by the Volunteers 54 to 24, leading to a 28-point margin of defeat.
Post play will be essential for success on the national scene, but, unfortunately, it will be a while in coming. Ashli Schwab has already suffered an injury this season, Hazel Joseph is still a question mark and the three freshmen post players brought in to help are still adjusting to college ball. Prior to the squad's first game of the season, an exhibition match against the Basketball Travelers, Portland made these problems abundantly clear.
"[The post play] is certainly not to the magnitude it needs to be," she said. "It will be a slow developing process; we are depending on three freshmen."
With this weakness, the Lady Lions may struggle with their pre-conference schedule and may have flashbacks to late March in Thompson-Boling Arena. But that is OK. It is OK for the women to drop a few games in the beginning of the season.
Why? Because when it gets to NCAA Tournament time, other than for seeding, record doesn't matter at all. All that matters is what happens in the game at hand.
The team that takes to the court this Friday will hardly be the same team that will play in March. I'm not going to expect to see the spring version of the Lady Lions when blizzard season hasn't even begun in Happy Valley; I won't write off the season with an early loss. There is time to develop post play, there is time to work out both offensive and defensive kinks, and there is time to get better. And the only way the women can truly get better is to play the very best.
Taking on the toughest teams in the nation in the first weeks of the season proves, beyond words, that the Lions are committed to their goal of a Final Four appearance. Whether or not they make it there is a different story. But if early losses mean the Final Four, the women would take it and run. Because for this team, for this season, for this final push -- they will look for the dividends to be paid in the postseason.
