It's just another basketball game, two teams playing to win a game that matters very little in the overall scheme of a season. UConn head coach Geno Auriemma is boosted by player Stacy Hansmeyer after the Huskies defeated Tennessee for the 1999-2000 National Championship last spring. When the University of Washington women tip off tonight against defending national champion Connecticut, it's going to be much more than a basketball game. It's going to be history.
Tonight is another chapter in a basketball story as long as any in the nation.
The UW has the opportunity to write the opening lines of what is one of the greatest tales in college basketball. This story is about Hec Edmundson Pavilion. The facility opened in 1927 and is the oldest on-site facility of its type in the nation, according to UW women's coach June Daugherty. Tonight at 7, the women's team makes its home debut in a stadium revitalized by a renovation started in 1997. After a year away, playing their games in Mercer Arena and KeyArena, they make a heralded return to Bank of America Arena at Hec Ed with a game against the best in the nation.