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Open Thread: NCAA Division I Women's Basketball Championship Tonight at 8:30 PM ET - Can Louisville complete the championship sweep?

After the Louisville Cardinals men's basketball team completed their end of the bargain last night by defeating the Michigan Wolverines 82-76 in the men's national championship last night, the Cardinals' women's basketball team looks to do the same tonight against the Connecticut Huskies. Game is at 8:30 PM Eastern on ESPN and ESPN 3.

UConn Guard Kelly Faris drives to the basket with Louisville Guard Jude Schimmel defending her in a January regular season game.  Expect more of the same tonight in the national championship.
UConn Guard Kelly Faris drives to the basket with Louisville Guard Jude Schimmel defending her in a January regular season game. Expect more of the same tonight in the national championship.
David Butler II-USA TODAY Sports

For UConn, I gotta say that Breanna Stewart is playing in Beast Mode. If she wasn't already in that mode in the 1st Round through the Elite Eight, she sure as hell was in the semifinal game against Notre Dame. Scarier thing is that she is only a freshman! Should her stellar play continue tonight, expect the Huskies to be cutting the nets for the eight time in school history.

Louisville has played with as much hustle as anyone, and we definitely have seen that with the Schimmel sisters (Jessica's awesome piece is here), and have really stepped up their perimeter shooting last several games and if this lasts for one more game, you never know....

In more basketball news, two important basketball figures in the women's game are headed to Springfield!

North Carolina women's basketball head coach Sylvia Hatchell was officially named to the Naismith Hall of Fame yesterday, where she won over 900 games, and led the Tar Heels to the 1994 National Championship.

South Carolina women's basketball head coach Dawn Staley was also named to the Naismith Hall of Fame yesterday, albeit as a player where she was a three time All American at Virginia and scored over 2,000 points, 700 assists, and 400 steals. In addition, she won three Olympic gold medals as a player in 1996, 2000, and 2004. As a professional basketball player, Coach Staley was on the ABL's Philadelphia Rage, and played in the WNBA for the Charlotte Sting and Houston Comets.

And we have another link!

Greg Alan Edwards of A Sea of Blue, our SBN Kentucky Wildcats blog has a great post on NCAA basketball officiating. As basketball fans, we always seem to complain about officiating no matter what, but he has some great suggestions here to increase accountability of NCAA basketball referees to get the calls right from instant replay, to making the rules in NCAA men's and women's basketball exactly the same. One difference between the men's and women's games is that the men's game has a 35 second shot clock with a 10 second backcourt rule, while the women's game has a 30 second shot clock but no backcourt rule.

In the end

That's all I got for today. Enjoy the basketball ladies and gentlemen!