Even though the Central Texas area got some rain this week, a drought continued on the University of Texas campus.
The Texas women's basketball was beaten by UCLA in the Final Four round of the NCAA Tournament. That loss left Texas still searching for its first national championship since the 1985-86 season. That 1985-86 Texas team went 34-0, and became the first women's basketball team to go undefeated since the NCAA began crowning champions in that sport in 1982.
MORE: 1986 champs send message to Texas Final Four team
To celebrate the 40-year anniversary of that feat, Texas honored its champions during halftime of a Feb. 22 game against Mississippi State at Moody Center. Four members of that team — guard Kamie Ethridge, center Cara Priddy and forwards Fran Harris and Andea Lloyd — also recently spoke with the American-Statesman about their 1986 title run.
Even though Texas went undefeated that 1985-85 season, its title run arguably began with a loss the previous season: a 92-90 loss to Western Kentucky in the Sweet 16 of the 1985 NCAA Tournament. Missing out on the Final Four that was held in Austin's Erwin Center that year had set the expectations for Texas, which had six seniors.
Lloyd: Jody (Conradt) has talked about this many times about the heartbreak of the loss that we had at Western Kentucky. I just don't think there was — unless it was somebody like Clarissa (Davis), who was a freshman — there really wasn't anybody that wasn't on the same page of that's not happening to us again. That was sort of our expectation. There wasn't even talk, "Hey, let's go win a national championship" or "That's our goal." It was sort of like, "Hell no, that is not happening again where we lose when we're supposed to win."
Harris: It was last chance. It was like "Last Chance U." It was like, welp, last chance. I think that's the way all of us felt. We had let one get away, there was nothing we could do about that. It was literally like balls to the wall for the next year.
Priddy: We weren't going to be denied. There was a lot of pressure on us as well. You know when you buy a new car and you're worried about that first dent? We never got that, right? We were perfect, and that put even more pressure on us,o but it did help us get to the end and succeed.
Ethridge: I think there was such disappointment (in that Sweet 16 loss) that it fueled us. The Final Four was in Austin the year before, we were expected to be there. We all went to the Final Four as spectators and it was so depressing and I think it made a real impact on our resolve. You had a large group of seniors that were just determined to not feel that again.
In its history, the NCAA has had 10 undefeated champions in women's basketball. And while Texas was the first, the thought of going undefeated wasn't exactly novel. As Ethridge, currently the head coach at Washington State, pointed out, the Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women had an undefeated champion as recently as Kim Mulkey's Louisiana Tech team in 1982.
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During the 1985-86 season, Texas had only three games decided by fewer than 10 points. One of those was a 78-76 win over Ohio State in the season opener. After barely beating the Buckeyes, Texas went on a roll. Texas won its first nine games by an average of 15.7 points despite eight of those games coming against ranked opponents. The Longhorns then strolled to a Southwest Conference title.
Harris: We didn't set (going undefeated) as a goal because, for the most part, we played during an era where there were some ballers. It wasn't a thing to think you were going to go undefeated because teams were just so good. What made us talk about it more was all the media asking us about it. We looked up and we were 19-0 (after an 87-60 win over Houston Feb. 1, 1986). I remember that mark because a journalist said that in one of the press conferences, "You guys are 19-0. How does that feel?" We hadn't really thought about it. After that, it was difficult not to keep talking about the (undefeated) season. Then there comes a point during the season where you need to go undefeated or you're going home.
Priddy: I think we took it one game at a time, and we had to because we had some really tough games. We took it one game, one play at a time. We were supported from the athletic director down to the fans and cheerleaders. It wasn't just a team effort, it was a group effort, it was a University of Texas effort.
What was the key to success that season? As the team's point guard, Ethridge won a slew of national awards. Lloyd was an All-American. Davis and Harris were all-conference honorees while sophomore guard Beverly Williams was named the SWC's MVP. As a team, Texas scored 83.9 points per game. The Longhorns allowed 57.2.
Harris: It was a combination of youth, the era that we were in where you fought together, you fought with people, you didn't have NIL, you didn't have money. I really believe as someone said to me a couple weeks ago, there's something that happens when you go to battle with people that you've been hungry with. Not just the physiological, mental hunger. Like, legit. We didn't have a lot of money. We survived together. I think that was a part of the 1985-86 team.
Talented? For sure. Absolutely hungry, second five coming behind us who were killing us every day as starters. That's different. There was never any coasting because C.J. (Jones), Clarissa, Yulonda (Wimbish), those were All-American high school players. Candidly, Jody made it clear to us that if you don't get it done, somebody will take your spot. It was the perfect storm of the time when you stuck together and then the recruiting classes that Jody and her staff had put together that made us pretty formidable as a team, and then just understanding the extra pressure of this being our last opportunity as the six seniors.
Ethridge: We had six seniors on that team that played significant minutes, that were all stars. I just don't think you ever get that anymore. In the men's game, you don't because they're one-and-done. Now in the women's game, you're getting back to that but you're not doing it how we did it, you're getting kids out of the portal. This was a team that grew up together.
It had so much maturity and so much competitive excellence and such an elite mindset of what competitiveness looked like. And then you mix that in with a phenom in Clarissa and the athleticism of Beverly and Yulonda and some of the stuff that we had in the other classes.
Following a close call against Ole Miss in the Elite Eight, Texas got its revenge against Western Kentucky with a 90-65 rout in the national semifinals. That set up a showdown at Rupp Arena in Lexington, Ky., with USC, which Texas had beaten earlier this season.