411 on the Forty: Win over top-ranked Stanford lands women’s basketball in AP top 25

By Riley Zayas

Women’s basketball cracks Associated Press top 25
All it takes is one big win.

The Texas women’s basketball team knows that after cutting down the top-ranked team in the nation, Stanford, Sunday in a victory that propelled head coach Karen Aston’s team into the Associated Press top 25 rankings for the first time since the second week of the season. Texas just got in, too, beating out Minnesota to claim the No. 25 spot.

After beginning the season at No. 15, early losses to USF and Arizona dropped the Longhorns to No. 22 and then completely out of the poll until this week. Talk about [s2If current_user_can(access_s2member_level2)]a turnaround: UT didn’t even receive a single vote for last week’s poll.

Sophomore Charli Collier was rewarded for her efforts in both of this past week’s wins, earning National Player of the Week awards form both ESPNW and the U.S. Basketball Writers Association (USBWA). Against Ohio Wednesday, she brought down 16 rebounds and scored 10 points for her seventh double-double of the year. She then added another double-double Sunday; her eight tie forward Joyner Holmes for the team lead. Collier had a game-high 20 points and career-high 19 rebounds in the victory over Stanford. Her performance on the boards made her the first Longhorn since 2014 to tally more than 19 rebounds in a single game.

Women’s golf, women’s tennis invited to prestigious 2020 tournaments
The women’s golf team and women’s tennis already are preparing for huge invitational events in 2020. The golfers will head to Lake Elmo, Minnesota Sept. 13-16 for the ANNIKA Intercollegiate, one of the most prestigious college golf tournaments in the nation which regularly invites several top-10 teams. In 2020, the No. 1 Longhorns will join No. 2 Arizona State, No. 3 Arizona, No. 4 USC, No. 8 Wake Forest, No. 9 South Carolina, No. 10 Duke and unranked Alabama, UCLA, Vanderbilt and Minnesota, the host team. This is the fourth consecutive year in the tournament for the Longhorns, who are seeking their first tournament title. Vanderbilt is the defending champion in the tournament.

The tennis women’s team will compete Jan. 10-12in the Caribbean at the augural Pink Flamingo Invitational in the Bahamas. The event will feature four teams hailing from different parts of the country: Florida, Miami, UCLA and UT. Each of the four schools is expected to be in the Intercollegiate Tennis Association’s top 20 when the ITA reveals its first ranking in a few weeks. Between the four teams, there will be 12 nationally ranked players at the event, including the Longhorns’ Anna Turati, who was ranked fourth in the final fall rankings.

Men’s basketball takes a group of third graders on holiday shopping spree
Sophomore Gerald Liddell helps a young girl pick out a necklace, junior Jase Febres trots down the Christmas card aisle with an elementary school boy, junior Royce Hamm, Jr., shakes his head excitedly as a boy finally finds the perfect long sleeve shirt, and several Longhorn players don superhero masks along with their third grade companions.

This isn’t a typical scene when you walk into a Target. However, that’s exactly what Texas men’s basketball head coach Shaka Smart and his men’s basketball team were up to last week when they aided 21 students from nearby Blackshear Elementary in a holiday shopping spree. Every member of the team participated in some way, whether helping a child pick out a pair of jeans or signing basketballs, and made a tremendous impact during this holiday season and time of giving. It was a reminder that this team’s contribution to the community goes far beyond the court. Not only can the Longhorns bring the Texas faithful together as they continue a quest to make the NCAA tournament, but they also become role models for the city’s youth and can become those positive influences that drive kids to work hard, better themselves and strive to become the best they can be both in school and in sports.
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