Doris Burke, a basketball analyst and reporter for ESPN and a former college basketball player at Providence College, has covered the NBA, NCAA women’s basketball and NCAA men’s basketball over the course of her television career. Burke offered commentary on the game between No. 2 South Carolina and No. 6 Tennessee, which the Gamecocks won 71-66. Before the game, The Daily Gamecock caught up with Burke and got her thoughts on South Carolina, Dawn Staley and the rest of women’s basketball.
TDG: What are your overall thoughts on this women’s basketball season in particular? What storyline or storylines stand out to you?
Burke: Well, I think the most important thing to start the year was Stanford upsetting UConn on [Stanford’s] home floor. It was a trigger point for hope across women’s basketball. This idea that the defending national champion, who had handled Notre Dame with such ease in the Final Four, could be beat and could be beat early. So, I think that was the first tipping point in the season, it happened in November. I think the fact that South Carolina was No. 1 for such a long stretch of time is good for women’s basketball. There is what I call UConn fatigue. From a casual fan standpoint, I think sort of there’s a sense that only Connecticut can win the national title and that, to me, is dangerous for women’s college basketball. So, I thought it was crucial that someone else ascended to number one and stayed there for a long time. And now we have a compelling opportunity for a rematch between one and two in the Final Four.
TDG: When you look at this South Carolina team, what stands out about it? What are its strengths?
Burke: Well, I think you begin on the defensive end of the court. I think that Dawn Staley has been around long enough to know that defense is what wins you championships. UConn has won more than any other program in history and everyone wants to talk about how good they are offensively, but they have won those nine titles because they’ve been by and large the best defensive team in the country, so I would begin with their defense. I think on the offensive end, you can look at somebody like Tiffany Mitchell, who in a possession ball game is not afraid of the moment and can deliver shots at every moment you might possibly need. Their depth is a factor, they can wear people out, their size inside is problematic for a lot of teams. There’s an awful lot to like about South Carolina.
TDG: A’ja Wilson, she’s just a freshman. How does she compare to other players who have had great freshman seasons?
Burke: Well, I think that the freshman of the year is probably a two person race between Brianna Turner at Notre Dame and A’ja Wilson. I think it could come down to simply who finishes stronger and where their respective teams finish overall. I think the adversity she had to face against Connecticut will help A’ja Wilson in the long term. You can tell she’s a competitive kid and not having the game she had up for in Storrs will help her achieve.
TDG: What do you think about Dawn Staley as a coach?
Burke: The first time I watched Dawn Staley practice, I was covering a men’s game in Philadelphia and [Staley] was using La Salle’s gym for some reason. She was the head coach at Temple, and I was there several hours before getting ready for my men’s game, but watched Temple practice. I remember all the way back then — it would have been in her first or second year at Temple — how impressed I was with her command of the game, her ability to reach those kids. I remember distinctly, there was a moment at the end of practice when she brought the group together and she was unhappy with one, the level of intensity and two, that there seemed to be some dissatisfaction with roles and she referenced a moment when she was the Olympic team point guard. She said, "You know what, I didn’t always agree that I wasn’t the starting point guard on the Olympic team, but I can tell you that I still did my job to the best of my ability." There’s cache in that kind of message with history and experience that naturally I think players would gravitate to.