With Texas’ season on the line, Longhorns turn to two freshman to beat Tennessee and reach Elite Eight

Published 11:18 pm Saturday, March 29, 2025

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Bryanna Preston came to the rescue.

When things looked their bleakest and the No. 1 seeded Texas women’s basketball team found itself tied at 50 in a back-and-forth game with fifth seed Tennessee, Vic Schaefer turned to a precocious freshman guard who had never started a game all season and totaled only four points in his team’s first two NCAA Tournament games.

Naturally.

That’s how the postseason works sometimes when production comes from someone who’s least expected.

Of course, Preston could have just as easily done all this heroic work for the Lady Volunteers.

“I came very close,” said Preston, a 5-9 guard out of Jonesboro, Ga., when asked how close she came to picking Tennessee as her school of choice a year ago before deciding on Texas. “I knew Coach Schaefer would be the best coach for me and get me ready for the next league, and playing with Rori Harmon would be great. Going against her in practice. I mean, if I can guard her …”

In fact, Schaefer once marveled at Preston’s energy, calling her “Rori on steroids.”

Preston still keeps up with Volunteers head coach Kim Caldwell, whose club gave the Longhorns the scare of its NCAA life, as well as some of the Tennessee players. But she felt like Texas was the right place for her.

Her mother was a stretch four for now-named Texas State just down the road from Texas in San Marcos, and Preston has family in San Antonio to help Bryanna from getting homesick.

And Saturday’s Sweet 16 game was the right time for her as she brought her boundless energy and speed on the floor at Legacy Arena and spearheaded a 67-59 win to help Texas escape a taxing, physical game and advance to the Elite Eight.

Another one.

The Longhorns reached that level for the fourth time in Schaefer’s last five seasons as they desperately try to crack the Final Four for the first time in his tenure in Austin and for the school’s first time since 2003.

They can mostly thank the animated Preston and freshman teammate Jordan Lee for securing the team’s third straight win in the tournament. The two combined for 25 points and scored eight of Texas’ 17 points in the fourth quarter when their energy and defense helped clamp down on Tennessee, which missed its last five shots over the final four minutes and was held to nine points in the period.

The two rookies are the closest of friends off the court as well even though they’re nothing alike.

“We’re exact opposites off the floor,” said the extroverted Lee, a 6-foot guard from Stockton, Calif., who nailed three of her five shots from behind the arc. “She’s mostly quiet. I’m so serious about that. She’s shy, and I’m planning everything. We’re complete 360s.”

Or 180s, but her point is made. They blended together to provide a tremendous lift off the bench, part of this deep supporting cast that provided 25 points Saturday and helped throttle a Tennessee team that averaged 31 three-point attempts a game but sank just five of 26 tries.

“Collectively, we all wanted it so bad,” Harmon said. “For us holding them to nine points in the fourth quarter, that’s how we play defense. That is us.”

And that includes Preston and Jones, who played all but one minute of the fourth quarter when Preston went out briefly.

But Texas needed every ounce of fight in their two freshmen who are carving out more and more time at this critical juncture of the season. Preston played a season-high 27 minutes and Lee 33 minutes.

Preston scored a season-best 12 points and had one pivotal three-minute stretch when she had a steal and a breakaway layup, took back-to-back charges and found Madison Booker on an in-bounds pass for an easy jumper to separate from the Vols after a 52-52 tie.

“These two freshmen might have been the difference today,” Schaefer said. “This is our juice. They have juice on the bench and play with juice on the floor.”

No doubt about it, they were. Texas doesn’t win for the 18th time in its last 19 games without them, but had enough poise to hang on.

It did, in part, because Schaefer’s got a basketball-savvy team that doesn’t panic and knows how to win. Even the freshmen.

“They’re both cerebral kids,” Schaefer said. “Like they’re really smart. Jordan Lee, you know, she may be doing open heart surgery in ten years. Both those kids are extremely smart, but their competitive spirit is off the chart. Like it’s just really special to have freshmen like that.”

The Longhorns now will play Monday against TCU, which has been one of the surprise stories in women’s basketball this season and had never even reached the Sweet 16 level before.

That changed Saturday afternoon when the Horned Frogs (34-3) outlasted No. 3 seed Notre Dame 71-62 behind as strong a two-woman tandem as there is in 6-7 center Sedona Prince and hot-shooting guard Hayley Van Lith, who combined for 47 points and 15 rebounds.

Texas is more than a little familiar with both since Prince was a one-time Longhorn for a minute before transferring to Oregon for two seasons and then TCU. The left-handed Van Lith was a key member of the Louisville team that upset Texas in a second-round game 73-51 on its home court at Moody Center two years ago.

Tennessee gave Texas all it wanted and maybe more in a physical game that at times more resembled a football game, considering how many fouls were made and not called.

The finish may well have served as a prelude to next season when Schaefer had his four-guard lineup on the floor that prominently featured Preston and Lee.

Lee gave Texas some instant offense.

Preston gave it everything else.

Not that it should be a surprise because this four-star recruit does it all. She’s so fast that friends of her dub her “Flash” or “Breezy” and note that she ran the 100 meters, 200 meters and sprint relay team.

She was all-everything for her 6A Wesleyan School basketball team in Jonesboro, Ga., where she led her team to a state championship as a sophomore and a state runner-up finish as a junior. And now she might be on the precipice of another title although things got pretty tense Saturday.

Not that Lee and Preston got uptight.

“We weren’t,” Lee said. “I’m not going to lie. We were having so much fun out there. Well, I got pretty nervous, but it’s like our coaches tell us, ‘Nobody’s going to die out there.'”

But a season could have.

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