Montana draws Georgia in NCAA tournament
3/18/2013 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
March 18, 2013
2013 NCAA Women's Basketball Championship Bracket 
The Montana women's basketball team received a No. 13 seed to the 2013 NCAA Division I Women's Basketball Championship and will face No. 4 Georgia Saturday at Gonzaga's McCarthey Athletic Center in Spokane, Wash.
The Lady Griz (24-7), the Big Sky Conference's automatic entry to the tournament, and Bulldogs (25-6), an at-large selection out of the SEC, will tip off at approximately 4:40 p.m. (MT). The game will be shown on a regional basis on ESPN2.
The opening game at the site will feature No. 5 Iowa State (23-8) against No. 12 Gonzaga (27-5). The Cyclones and Zags will tip off at 2:15 p.m. (MT). Montana and Georgia will follow 30 minutes after the first game's conclusion.
Saturday's winners will meet Monday at 7:30 p.m. (MT).
Montana is making its 20th appearance at the NCAA tournament in the event's 32-year history, an impressive resume overshadowed by Georgia's. The Bulldogs, the 1985 and '96 national runners-up and five-time Final Four participants, are playing in their 19th straight NCAA tournament and 30th overall, a number surpassed only by Tennessee's perfect 32.
Georgia ranks fifth all-time with 52 tournament wins. Montana is 6-19 in tournament games and has bowed out in the first round in its last nine appearances. One of those first-round losses came in 2000, when the Lady Griz, a No. 16 seed, lost at No. 1 Georgia 74-46 in the teams' only other meeting.
The coaches in that game -- Montana's Robin Selvig and Georgia's Andy Landers -- are still coaching at their schools and are two of the winningest NCAA Division I women's basketball coaches of all-time.
Selvig has 798 wins in 35 seasons at Montana. Landers, who coached four years at Roane State before taking the Georgia job prior to the 1979-80 season, has 820 career wins. Landers ranks fifth on the active wins list, Selvig sixth.
"I've known Andy for a long time, before we ever played them in Georgia," Selvig said. "Obviously they are one of the premier programs in the country.
"I have not followed them that closely this year, but I'm sure they are the same type of team they have always been. Very talented, very quick, very well-coached."
Montana last made the NCAA tournament in 2011 and also played that first-round game in Spokane, where the No. 14 Lady Griz fell to No. 3 UCLA 55-47. Montana will have the convenience of a three-hour bus trip to Spokane, while Georgia will be facing a 2,400-mile plane trip.
"It's a great thing for us to be that close, because we'll have great fan support," Selvig said. "It can be a real struggle for family and friends to get to these things when they are really far away."
Senior Ali Hurley, who played seven minutes off the bench against the Bruins two years ago, added, "We're excited to be going back to Spokane. It's not that far away, so all of our fans and families will be able to go. It will be awesome, almost like a home-court edge."
