My powers of prediction are still malfunctioning on Day 2 of the 2008 SEC Women’s Basketball Tournament, both in terms of basketball and the weather. I had predicted Georgia would exact some revenge on Matt Mitchell’s surprising Kentucky team for knocking them out of a #4 seed and a first round bye: didn’t happen. I also predicted the overly excitable weathermen were exaggerating when they called for rain, sleet, and three to five inches of snow for Nashville and the surrounding area on this second day of the tourney. Ahem… I just slid home from Nashville’s Sommet Center, after scraping a quarter inch of ice and brushing away the four inches of snow that had also accumulated on my Jeep windshield while I had been lost in basketball oblivion … you get the frigid picture. So here’s the results from the afternoon session of Day 2.

Game 5: #1 seed LSU Tigers vs. #8 seed Ole Miss Rebels. Renee Ladner, Ole Miss’ self-professed “old rookie” coach, saw her first run in the SEC tourney come to a screeching halt, with LSU pouncing on the Rebels 80-36. When you’re Ole Miss and the first shot you put up in the game is blocked by the shortest player on the court -- LSU’s 5’3” point guard dynamo Erica White -- you know you’re in for a long afternoon. Adrenaline had to be pulsing through Ole Miss’ veins early, as they stayed with the Tigers for the first few minutes of the game. The Rebels’ inside players adjusted their shots nicely and hit a couple of jumpers in the lane over Fowles, the newly crowned SEC Player of the Year, but just as quickly as you could say “Geaux Tigers”, LSU had stretched the lead to 15-7. Fowles took a seat on the bench after picking up a couple of namesakes, but seldom used senior center Mesha Williams came in and gave Van Chancellor some solid minutes in the post. This is good news for the Tigers, since the rest of this tourney and the remainder of the post season will necessarily bring double and triple teams Big Syl’s way, and it’s nice to see LSU not skip a beat if Fowles has to sit a spell. In fact, this game became such a blowout that SEC Coach of the Year Chancellor was able to rest most of his starters for a sizeable portion of the second half. Keeping fresh legs is a good thing, because winning three games in three days can be tough, especially against the competition one finds at the top of the SEC.

On Thursday, after the Rebels’ win over instate rival Mississippi State in the first round, Ladner had stated that Ole Miss would need more than one double-digit scorer against LSU if they expected to have any hopes of winning against the Tigers. But LSU shut the Rebs down completely in all aspects of the game, and held every Ole Miss player to single digits. Ole Miss’ 36 point total for the game set a new low mark for fewest points scored in an SEC Tournament game. Most notable is the fact that LSU’s bench outscored the entire Ole Miss team, coming in to score 38 of the team’s 80 point total. LSU dominated in every statistical category, outshooting Ole Miss from the field 49.2% to 22.6%. Ole Miss only connected on 2 of 14 from behind the arc for 14.3% while LSU launched 16 treys, hitting 7 of them for 43.8%. The Tigers pummeled the Rebs on the boards, outrebounding them 50-34, and had 20 assists to Ole Miss’ 6. LSU coach Van Chancellor stated in post-game that he felt their defensive work on the boards was the best that it’s been all year. LSU was led by Quianna Chaney’s 17 points, and Sylvia Fowles, the SEC’s all-time double-double leader, added one more to her total, tallying 10 points and 10 rebounds in only 17 minutes of action.

On the inside presence of Sylvia Fowles and how she affects the game, coach Ladner stated: “If you get around the first line of defense, there’s a tree standing in the middle of the lane and the branches go from one side of the court to the other. You’re not looking at the rim, you’re looking at Sylvia and she is the best defensive player in the country -- she alters everything you are trying to do.” Coach Chancellor was especially gracious about meeting 2 of his former players in this game: both Ole Miss head coach Ladner and assistant Peggie Gillom-Granderson played for Chancellor during his 18-year tenure at Ole Miss. Chancellor said that for him, the only negative about this game was to play against two of his former players and for the score to be what it was. “I hate to put a score up there like that for their sake because I wouldn’t be here today if it wasn’t for Renee and Peg and players like that. It‘s about my former players and I feel for them today, but it looks to me like they spent everything they had beating Mississippi State.”

Up next for LSU: a semifinal showdown with surprising #4 seed Kentucky.

Game 6: #2 seed Tennessee Lady Vols vs. #7 seed Florida Gators. Florida came into their quarterfinal game with a spotless 5-0 record when sporting their lucky orange jerseys, but the only lucky orange in this game was the Big Orange of Tennessee, as the Lady Vols prevailed 92-61. Florida stuck with UT early, hanging around within striking distance for the first half of the first half, trailing only 26-20 at the 10 minute mark, but UT’s depth and a solid 40-minute effort proved to be the Gators’ undoing. Florida’s leading scorer Marshae Dotson went 1-for-9 from inside early, before leaving with an injury only 6 minutes into the game. Dotson never returned to the lineup and Florida head coach Amanda Butler said she is unclear on her status. Meanwhile, UT’s Candace Parker scored 20 points in 15 minutes of play in the first half, and finished the game with 26 on 11-of-16 shooting from the field. Parker also pulled down 8 rebounds and added 4 more blocks to her single-season block record, which now stands at 103. Shannon Bobbitt added 22 points while dishing 6 assists, and Alexis Hornbuckle was UT’s third double-digit scorer with 16. UT shot 55.4% from the field versus Florida’s 32.5%, but a glaring statistic is the fact that UT got to the line 20 times, connecting on 13, while Florida only hit 3 out of their 8 free throws for the game. Florida was led in scoring by Sha Brooks with 20 and Depree Bowden chipped in 15.

Coach Pat Summitt, none the worse for wear after her tangle with a particularly vicious raccoon earlier in the week (more on that later), was especially pleased with her team’s guard play and the fact that they gave the 40-minute effort she’s been looking for. Coach Summitt said at times this season, they have played in spurts, just trying to close out games. She said this team, if they could, would probably have said let’s fast-forward through the season and get to the post-season, but she feels it was that mind-set which cost them in their loss to LSU. This win over Florida was a different matter. When Parker asked Summitt in the post-game “we played a 40-minute game, didn’t we?”, Summitt replied, “We did. I’m glad to say that. It makes me happy.” Parker replied amidst much laughter, “It’s on the record. Write that down please.”

Florida coach Amanda Butler, in her rookie season as a head coach in the SEC, has nothing to hang her head about. Butler finishes SEC play with the most improved team in the league from last season, have notched 9 more wins than last year’s Gator team. When asked about her team’s post-season chances, Butler stated, “I know that we’ll be playing in the post-season. It’s just a matter of who we’ll be playing against and which tournament we’ll be participating in.” Although I think Florida’s chances of making it into the Big Dance are slim to none, this much improved Gator team deserves a WNIT bid.

Up next for the Vols: a semifinal matchup against the Vanderbilt Commodores.