ALBANY, N.Y. — After Louisville lost to Iowa in the Elite Eight last year, Hailey Van Lith was back in her apartment in Kentucky watching the national title game.
In what many dubbed as the “Caitlin vs. Angel Show,” Van Lith saw her soon-to-be teammates defeat the Hawkeyes 102-85, the most points scored in an NCAA women’s title game.
Van Lith, who entered the transfer portal and ended up committing to LSU on April 27, 2023, said she remembers the excitement of the title game and “the emotions that you can see through the TV.”
“I felt like it was a huge moment for women’s basketball. And I felt like a weird like drawing to like how emotional the game was,” Van Lith told reporters on Sunday. “I felt like I could really relate to that, and that’s how I play and stuff. I was like ‘I want to play on that team.'”
Van Lith was one of two transfers head coach Kim Mulkey picked up in the offseason, also adding Aneesah Morrow from DePaul, ESPN’s No. 2 rated player in the portal. Van Lith and Morrow have each found themselves in the starting lineup for the Tigers, averaging 11.7 and 16.5 points per game, respectively. Morrow also grabs 9.9 rebounds per contest.
Mulkey said LSU doesn’t have the same personnel this season, so the game plan will “not even mention” what the Tigers did last season against the Hawkeyes.,
“We’re not gonna have to knock down dumpers to beat Iowa,” Mulkey said. “We’re going to have to play hard. We’re going to have to defend. We’re going to have to get back in transition defense. We have to do a lot of little things to beat them.”
While Mulkey, Reese, and Flau’jae Johnson said most of the attention is on Clark, they have to make sure No. 22’s supporting cast aren’t getting open or hitting shots. In last year’s title game, Clark had 30 points and eight 3-pointers. Her teammates Monika Czinano, Kate Martin, and Gabbie Marshall also scored in double figures in the loss.
This season, Iowa’s turned to Molly Davis, Sydney Affolter, and Kylie Feuerbach. Davis suffered a knee injury in Iowa’s final regular season game against Ohio State and has not played in the postseason. Affolter has started in her place and given Iowa a spark on both sides of the ball, averaging 13 points and 7.6 boards since being inserted into the starting five against Penn State in the Big Ten quarterfinals. Hannah Stuelke, a second-year who now starts in lieu of Czinano, averages a healthy 14 points and 6.8 rebounds per game while shooting 62.6 percent from the field.
“The difference is those that who were role players last year are now big players [for Iowa]. That’s what all coaches hope is that you respect the process, and when your time arrives, you take advantage of it,” Mulkey said. “They’re still going to shoot a lot of threes. But Caitlin Clark is a generational player, and she’s not all about threes. She can pass the ball, she can take you off the dribble. You’re not going to stop her. You just hope that you can contain her a little bit and make sure that you do your job on the other four players.”
Johnson will have the tough task of guarding Clark on Monday. The Tiger has been the scoring and emotional leader for LSU this postseason. She’s averaging 19.6 points and 6.3 rebounds in this year’s NCAA Tournament while shooting nearly 60 percent from the field.
Johnson said she is excited about the challenge and knows there’s no stopping Clark. Her goal is to contain the NCAA’s all-time leading scorer as best as she can and make herself better in the process.
“Last year I got a switch on her early in the game, and I was like, ‘She’s not going to pull that for real’ — and then she pulled it for real from like half court and made it, and I was like, ‘Woah,'” Johnson said of matching up against Clark in the title game last season. “For me, I want to compete at the highest level, and right now, Caitlin is the highest level.”
Iowa head coach Lisa Bluder and Mulkey agreed its a little unfortunate that the two squads are meeting this early. Ultimately, though, they’re just happy to have a crack at a spot in the Final Four and think Monday’s contest on ESPN will draw nearly the same viewership as the national championship, which was the most watched women’s basketball game in television history with an average of 9.9 million viewers.
“It might be a little motivating factor, you know, if you lost the game to them before,” Mulkey said of Iowa’s possible mindset coming into the Elite Eight after losing to LSU last season. “But I can’t imagine them being more motivated than my team. I just can’t imagine that.”