The Ole Miss Women’s Basketball team is a lock for the postseason; however, the Lady Rebels’ last two regular season games and the SEC Tournament will have great bearing on their postseason seeding and whether they will have home court advantage.
The No. 19 Lady Rebels (21-8, 8-6 SEC) will travel to Florida (16-13, 4-10 SEC) on Thursday, Feb 26. The team will then host Texas A&M (12-11, 5-9 SEC) on Sunday, March 1, in their last regular season game of the year.
In women’s college basketball, regional sites for the first and second rounds of the NCAA Tournament are hosted by the Top 16 seeds (seeds 1-4 in each region). Based on this ranking, if the season ended today, the Lady Rebels would be a No. 5 seed, meaning they would be forced to play on the home court of the No. 4 seed in their region.
There is still time for the Lady Rebels to move up in seeding, though it is quickly running out. The matchups against Florida and Texas A&M are must-win games. Both are bottom five teams in the conference who will not make the postseason. They provide excellent opportunities for the Lady Rebels to make up for losing three of its past four games during a brutal eight-day stretch.
Head coach Yolett McPhee-McCuin is not discouraged by this skid. On Feb. 23, she reposted a postgame press conference of Houston Men’s Basketball on X, when head coach Kelvin Sampson spoke about how losses are treated as catastrophes for teams that have set a high standard. McPhee-McCuin pointed out that the Lady Rebels’ losses against No. 7 LSU and No. 3 South Carolina are the first time this season Ole Miss has lost back-to-back games.
“This is the first time we’ve lost two games in a row this season and now the world is supposed to end right? Come on man! Rocking with Team 51! Two more games in (the regular) season!” McPhee-McCuin said.
Wins against Florida and Texas A&M will do little to boost the Lady Rebels’ seeding. However, these victories could serve to improve Ole Miss’ SEC rankings, which, in turn, would set the Lady Rebels up for success in the SEC Tournament.
The Top 4 teams in the conference earn double byes in the conference tournament. Seeding does not matter as much here, since all games will be played in Greenville, S.C., so there is no such thing as home court advantage.
The Lady Rebels currently sit at No. 6 in the SEC rankings. Since they are two games behind LSU, who sits at No. 4 — and because LSU holds the tiebreaker, since the Tigers beat the Lady Rebels in their head-to-head matchup — the Lady Rebels will not earn a double bye.
Still, they could, feasibly, move up to No. 5, giving them an easier path to the late rounds of the conference tournament. Oklahoma is currently No. 5 in the conference with an SEC record of 9-7; the Sooners’ remaining games are against Arkansas (11-18, 0-14 SEC) and Missouri (16-13, 4-10 SEC), both of whom are at the bottom of the conference.
If they drop one of these games, however, and Ole Miss wins out, then both will finish conference play with the same record. Ole Miss would then hold the tiebreaker, since the Lady Rebels beat the Sooners on Jan. 8.
Still, the road to doing well enough in the SEC Tournament to move up to a No. 4 seed NCAA Tournament will not be easy. Forward Cotie McMahon, averaging 20.0 points per game, has been a key part to the Lady Rebels’ success. She scored 39 points and 10 rebounds in the Rebels win over No. 21 Tennessee. However, against South Carolina, she finished with only 2 points on 0-of-9 from the field. If her struggles continue, the Lady Rebels will have slim hopes for improving their seeding.
More bad news: Guard Sira Thienou was sidelined with an injury in the Tennessee game and did not play against LSU or South Carolina. She averages the second-most minutes per game (28.4) of anyone on the team and has been a valuable anchor for the backcourt. The Lady Rebels will not be at their best as long as she remains sidelined.
However, Ole Miss has won games against tough opponents the whole season, including two wins against then Top 5 teams. If McMahon can return to her normal self, the Lady Rebels could make noise in the SEC Tournament and inch up the overall rankings enough to secure home court advantage in the postseason tournament.
