In the spring of 1980, Joe Paterno had a problem. It wasn't that his football team had just finished a ho-hum season with a mediocre win over a mediocre Tulane team in the mediocre Liberty Bowl. Not just the Penn State football coach, Paterno was also the athletic director, and was placing ads in the classifieds.

Wanted -- head coach for women's basketball program at football powerhouse in quaint Pennsylvania town not known for harboring basketball fans.

Paterno found more than he bargained for in Colorado women's basketball coach Rene Portland.

Fast-forward 25 years, and the football school in central Pennsylvania boasts one of the premier programs in women's basketball.

"As soon as you get to campus you start to understand the tradition of Lady Lion basketball at Penn State," senior point guard Jess Strom said. "At Penn State it's either football, or Lady Lion basketball."

Coming into the 2004-2005 season, Portland's tenure at Penn State has garnered 562 wins, 649 wins when combined with her earlier coaching gigs at Colorado and St. Joseph's, good enough for seventh in the all-time coaching victories in women's basketball. Portland was the second-fastest woman to ever reach 500 wins -- only Pat Summitt of Tennessee did it faster.

Back in the day, the Lady Lions were the cream of the Atlantic 10 Conference: 1983 -- Atlantic-10 Tournament champions, 1984 -- champions, 1985 -- champions, 1986 -- champions, 1987 -- champions.

That's the idea.

When the Lady Lions joined the Big Ten Conference in 1992, they finished with a 9-0 conference record at home during the 1992-1993 season. The next season -- Big Ten Champions.

The Lady Lions under Portland have five Big Ten Championships under their belt, including the last two years -- aiming for the three-peat this year.

Portland had her share of appearances in the Big Dance, too -- 20 NCAA Tournament berths. The Lady Lions reached the Final Four in 2000, but one thing has remained out of Portland's reach: a national championship.

When the Lady Lions take the court against No. 8 Michigan State on Sunday, it's "Rene Sunday."

"To be real honest, we have a big game to play and that's really been my attitude when [marketing has] come to talk to me about it," Portland said. "But 25 years have been great. A lot of things happened here at Penn State that I'm not sure I knew was going to happen or those people who made those decisions, I don't think they knew it was going to happen either."

It takes time to go from one good team to a prestigious program.

"So we're very, very fortunate at Penn State to have what we have and the kids understand that," Portland said. "As we've traveled to other places that the fights have been good fights and the hard work that we've done in the community has paid off. And certainly the hard work they've done in the gym has paid off and the tradition of the Lady Lions is one that I'm very proud of."

After 25 years, the coach Paterno hired with a similar vision to his own -- academics and family first, win but win with character -- Portland has shown that what worked for Paterno on the gridiron, works on the basketball court, too.