By Wheat Hotchkiss
March 4, 2012
INDIANAPOLIS — Purdue was a worthy champion. The Boilermakers held off a feisty Nebraska squad Sunday night at Banker’s Life Fieldhouse for a 74-70 double-overtime victory. They received the trophy, hats and t-shirts that go to the Big Ten Women’s Tournament champions, and deservedly so.
The same cannot be said for the All-Tournament selections.
Look, I know for most people the All-Tournament team is a trivial afterthought. It is a team tournament and the most important thing is who cuts down the nets.
But the point of the All-Tournament team is to recognize the most outstanding players over the course of the tournament. The Big Ten All-Tournament team is another reflection of flawed voting logic that runs counter to the intentions behind the team.
Three of the selections are fine. Nebraska’s Jordan Hooper and Lindsey Moore were the first and third-leading scorers in the event. In Sunday’s championship game they accounted for 52 of Nebraska’s 70 points. Purdue’s Brittany Rayburn is another correct decision. Rayburn propelled the Boilermakers into the title game, with a tournament-high 29 points and seven three-pointers in the quarterfinals against Iowa and the game-winning basket in the closing seconds of a semifinal upset of top-seeded Penn State.
But the rest of the team is a series of blunders.
The worst decision by far is the inclusion of Ohio State guard Samantha Prahalis. Prahalis is a tremendous player – she was named the conference’s Player of the Year. But she did not have a good tournament.
In the second-seeded Buckeyes quarterfinal win over seventh seed Michigan, Prahalis shot just 4-15 from the field and had a season-high seven turnovers. She had 23 points in the semifinal game, but she also had eight more turnovers as sixth-seeded Nebraska beat Ohio State handily.
But the voters ignored all of that. They knew she was the regular season Player of the Year (never mind that has nothing to do with the tournament). They knew she set the Big Ten career assist record against Michigan (never mind she entered the game just three assists shy of the mark). They saw Ohio State advanced to the semifinals (never mind they only had to win one game to do so). They focused on her 17 points per game average in her two games (never mind the 7.5 turnover average).
The final member of the team, Purdue’s KK Houser, is another improper choice. Houser was Purdue’s best player in the championship game, with a team-high 19 points, five steals, and no turnovers. But the rest of her tournament was lackluster. In Purdue’s first two games she had just nine total points, and matched her eight assists with eight turnovers.
Houser’s selection is likely the result of voters wishing to honor multiple members of the tournament champions (or perhaps give them as many as the runner-up Cornhuskers).
That same logic is what led to Rayburn being named Most Outstanding Player. Neither decision is justified.
The All-Tournament team and Most Outstanding Player should go to the five top and single-best players in the tournament, respectively, regardless of how their teams fared.
Minnesota freshman point guard Rachel Banham was the event’s fourth-leading scorer and third-leading rebounder. She nearly led her eight-seeded Golden Gophers to an upset of top seed Penn State. So what if her team lost in the quarterfinals? That doesn’t take away from how well she played individually.
And the best player in the entire tournament was clearly Hooper. She averaged a tournament-high 19.8 points per game and 9.0 rebounds. Purdue would have won the final much earlier if not for Hooper’s 25 and 10, her 12-12 shooting from the free throw, her game-saving block of Boilermaker guard Courtney Moses at the end of regulation.
Meanwhile Rayburn scored just nine points in the finale and spent a good portion of the overtime periods on the bench in foul trouble. But her team won, so she gets the honor.
In a way, only naming one Purdue player to the All-Tournament team or giving the Most Outstanding Player to Hooper would have further honored the Boilermakers. The Boilermakers were able to get great performances from several different players over the course of the tournament. Rayburn, Houser, Moses, Chantel Poston, Sam Ostarello, Antionette Howard…all of them had their moments in Purdue’s three victories. Purdue is a team with several key contributors but no star.
Even Purdue coach Sharon Versyp recognized that fact.
“We don't talk about individuals,” Versyp after her Boilermakers cut down the nets. “You don't just see one face everywhere on our program. It's about the whole team.”
Not naming Houser to the All-Tournament team or not giving Rayburn Most Outstanding Player would have been additional testament to Purdue’s great team, not a slight against them as individuals.
But All-Tournament voting has somehow warped into a formulaic, false process. Players don’t get picked if their team doesn’t make the semifinals. The Most Outstanding Player only goes to someone from the tournament champions. Regular season achievement even occasionally supersedes tournament performance.
That’s just wrong.
