Lindsay Whalen and Gophers players grateful for their WNIT opportunity

About two weeks ago, in the corridor outside the locker room at Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, Gadiva Hubbard wanted another chance, another game.

The Gophers women's basketball team had just lost to Northwestern, in a game that went down to the wire, in the Big Ten Conference tournament. Hubbard, who had scored six points on 2-for-7 shooting, felt she hadn't been at her best, and she didn't want her college career to end that way.

"I felt I wasn't myself,'' she said at the time. "It stinks it could have been my last game.''

Turns out, of course, it wasn't.

Sunday the Gophers, 14-17 overall, got a bid to the WNIT tournament, one of two teams with losing records — Vanderbilt from the powerful SEC Conference is the other. For Hubbard and the four other seniors or grad students on the team, it's another chance to play when the Gophers open the tournament Thursday night at Green Bay.

"It feels great,'' Hubbard said after practice Tuesday. "I really didn't want [the Big Ten tournament loss] to be our last game. We get another chance to show ourselves. To go into the WNIT and make a run, it would be great.''

Knowing her team would want to keep playing, coach Lindsay Whalen was in contact with WNIT officials almost immediately after the conference tournament loss. The team continued to practice last week anticipating its net rating and 5-5 finish to the season would be enough to get a bid.

The Gophers played a total of 12 games against 10 teams that made the NCAA tournament.

To Whalen, the WNIT is an opportunity to keep practicing and playing and more opportunity for the players who will return next year to get experience.

"I knew this group would want to play,'' Whalen said. "They wanted to keep going. Some schools, they were kind of, 'NCAA or nothing,' And I can't speak for how I would be in the future on that. But I want us to play, continue to get better, to learn. This is a group that wants more.''

Three of the last four WNIT champions – Arizona, Indiana and Michigan – are all a fourth seed or better in this year's NCAA tournament, and all three will host their opening games this week. To Whalen, that's proof of the merits of playing in the WNIT.