UNLV Lady Rebels head coach Lindy La Rocque cuts down the net after the Lady Rebels’ 75-65 victory over the Colorado State Rams in the Mountain West womens championship game at the Thomas & Mack Center Wednesday, March 9, 2022.
Wednesday, March 9, 2022 | 10:36 p.m.
Lindy La Rocque is ready to party.
The UNLV women’s basketball team completed a dominant Mountain West campaign on Wednesday, knocking off Colorado State in the conference championship game, 75-65, to punch their ticket to the NCAA Tournament.
After leading the Scarlet and Gray to a 25-6 overall record in the regular season, a 15-3 mark in league play and a romp through the MWC tournament that saw UNLV win its three games by an average margin of 11.3 points, La Rocque arrived to the postgame podium at the Thomas & Mack Center, freshly-cut net in hand, and made the case for a Gatsby-level soiree.
When asked what comes next for her team after securing its NCAA bid, she said her squad wants to let loose and have some fun.
“My boss is over there,” La Rocque said with a wink, nodding toward UNLV athletic director Erick Harper. “We’d better be throwing a rockin’ party on Sunday for the selection show.”
La Rocque and this UNLV squad certainly deserve it after holding off Colorado State.
The top-seeded Scarlet and Gray led by double figures for much of the game, but CSU closed the third quarter on an 8-0 run to trim UNLV’s lead to 54-59.
A driving 3-point play by Colorado State point guard McKenna Hofschild cut UNLV’s advantage to 62-61 with four minutes left, and at that point the Rams had serious intentions of spoiling UNLV’s season. With the pressure on, junior guard Essence Booker made a pull-up jumper to push the lead to 64-61. Following a defensive stop, freshman Kiara Jackson also connected on a short jump shot off the dribble to give UNLV a 66-61 advantage with three minutes remaining.
With 45 seconds to play, UNLV had the ball, a 69-65 lead and a chance to put the game away, but after the Scarlet and Gray recovered a loose ball La Rocque was forced to call timeout with just two seconds on the shot clock.
In the huddle, La Rocque drew up a play the team had installed just last week, a baseline out-of-bounds set she had cribbed from the Arizona playbook earlier in the season. Booker ran around a screen and popped to the corner, Jackson delivered a perfect inbound pass and Booker let fly a high-arching 3-pointer that splashed through the net as the shot clock expired.
Dagger. Dancing.
“We had two seconds, we knew we had to get a quick shot,” La Rocque said of the pivotal play. “We drew it up, we went out there and executed it perfectly. Desi set a great screen, they kind of switched out, Kiara made a perfect pass and Essence put the dagger in ‘em.”
Booker, who finished with 25 points, was named tournament MVP.
The Spring Valley product said UNLV practiced the play with a teammate breaking free for the shot, but once it was drawn up in the huddle for her she committed to making the biggest shot of the season.
“I was like, all right, I’m gonna make this,” Booker said. “Walking to the line, Khayla [Rooks] tapped me on my shoulder and she was like, ‘Make this shot. You’re going to make this shot.’ And I kept telling myself I’m going to make it. And they ended up doing something defensively that left me wide open, and I knocked it down.”
Sophomore center Desi-Rae Young finished with 14 points and seven rebounds. Rooks posted eight points and eight boards.
LaRocque has been nothing short of a rock star since being hired as UNLV’s head coach two years ago. She took over a squad that went 13-17 in 2019-20 and got them to 15-9 in her first season, including an impressive 13-5 mark in Mountain West play. That season was undone by a quarterfinal loss to Wyoming in the MWC tournament, however.
In her second season at the helm UNLV was clearly the league’s best team from wire to wire, and they proved it this week by knocking off Utah State, Air Force and Colorado State, all by double digits.
That’s why, in La Rocque’s estimation, Sunday is going to be a celebration.
“I’m just extremely proud,” La Rocque said. “I don’t know if it’s set in yet…They did whatever we needed to do. We talked about that in the beginning of the week — whatever it takes. And they did it. I’m really, really proud.”
The Scarlet and Gray won’t know their travel itinerary or their first-round opponent until it is revealed during Sunday’s official selection show. Expect them to head into the field as underdogs; ESPN’s latest bracket projection has UNLV slotted as a No. 13 seed, traveling to the Tucson site to face No. 4 Arizona.
Mike Grimala can be reached at 702-948-7844 or [email protected]. Follow Mike on Twitter at twitter.com/mikegrimala.
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