The road to Tampa, Women's basketball update, Week 12

With conference play coming to a close, many of the top conferences still remain up for grabs. As upsets continue to mount, we take a look back at the past week in the world of women’s basketball:

No. 15 Duke started the week with a 66-58 upset victory against No. 8 Louisville. The Blue Devils victory moved them to 7-2 in the ACC on the season and moved the young squad into ACC regular-season title contention. Duke still trails No. 4 Notre Dame and No. 9 Florida State—both of which had dominant weeks themselves— by one game in the loss column.

But the ACC upsets did not end there. Thursday, No. 25 Syracuse took out No. 13 North Carolina 61-56 for a much-needed home victory for the Orange. Syracuse’s victory was actually slightly helpful for the Blue Devils, who now stand two games ahead of the Tar Heels for fourth place in the conference. With the teams with the top four conference records automatically getting through to the quarterfinals, Duke’s week could not have been much better from a results perspective, though it did lose forward Oderah Chidom for the season.

Perhaps the most difficult conference to figure remains the Pac-12, which has had numerous teams share time in the top spot. No. 7 Oregon State appeared to be breaking away from the pack until the Beavers were dealt their first conference loss Friday on the road in a 76-67 loss to Washington. That same day, No. 10 Arizona State used a key block from Quinn Dornstauder at the buzzer to defeat No. 12 Stanford 53-52.

The wild Pac-12 was back at it Sunday when unranked California got a layup from Penina Davidson at the buzzer to stun the 10th-ranked Sun Devils 50-49. The upset was topped later in the day by one of the biggest stunners of the season. Sporting a 9-14 record on the season and with only one conference victory, unranked Arizona pulled off the home upset against No. 12 Stanford to hand the Cardinal their second conference loss of the weekend. Once believed to be a title contender, Stanford has now dropped seven games on the season—six to teams in the top-25 of the poll.

With another wild week in the books, all eyes turn to Storrs, Connecticut where No.1 South Carolina puts their unblemished record on the line against No. 2 Connecticut Monday.

The matchup pits two of the top coaching minds in the game against each other in Geno Auriemma and Dawn Staley, as well as two of the top players in the nation in Brianna Stewart and Tiffany Mitchell. The Huskies have won 15 of their last 16 games by more than 30 points and will look to use their home crowd to reclaim their throne atop women’s college basketball.

Rivals in Rank: No. 1 South Carolina at No. 2 Connecticut, Monday, Feb. 9, 8 p.m.; No. 11 Kentucky at No. 6 Tennessee, Sunday, Feb. 15, 3 p.m.