By ROBERT CESSNA
Eagle Staff Writer
BATON ROUGE, La. -- While Texas A&M women's basketball coach Gary Blair entertained the crowd at Reed Arena during Monday night's NCAA Tournament selection party, associate head coach Vic Schaefer was busy working two floors below.
Schaefer had plenty to do. He made telephone calls, broke down film and began putting together a scouting report for A&M's opening-round opponent, Texas-San Antonio.
Schaefer is much more than an assistant. As Blair's defensive coordinator, he has complete control over A&M's defense.
In fact, Blair entrusts Schaefer with so much that the head coach often will run the offensive portion of practice, then leave to hit the recruiting trails, do an interview or sometimes just watch Schaefer run the team.
Others across the nation are starting to watch Schaefer's work with equal interest. Often led by their defense, the Aggies have won 13 of their last 14 to earn a school-best No. 2 seed for the NCAA Tournament.
The Aggies have held opponents to 51.5 points per game in their last 13 victories. That's noticeably better than A&M's season average of 55.2, which ranks 16th nationally.
The bigger the game, the better A&M's defense has played.
A&M closed the regular season by holding Oklahoma State, Baylor and Oklahoma to a combined 34.9 percent shooting from the field, including just 22.2 percent from 3-point range.
"I thought the game was entirely too physical," Baylor head coach Kim Mulkey said after losing to A&M 72-53 loss at Reed Arena on March 1. "I thought they frustrated us. The tone was set after the jump ball. They were very, very physical."
With size and quickness, A&M has frustrated more than just Mulkey's Lady Bears.
Iowa State guard Heather Ezell had hit a Big 12 tournament-record seven 3-pointers in the first round, then broke her own record with eight in the quarterfinals. A&M held her to 2 of 9 from behind the arc in the semifinals, and she was 1 of 8 until hitting the last basket of the game in A&M's 65-53 victory.
"They rushed her and got up into her," Iowa State head coach Bill Fennelly said. "I think they're a team that relies on pressure defense and taking you out of stuff, and they're very good at it."
Oklahoma State's Andrea Riley, another all-conference guard, was only 2 of 10 shooting 3-pointers in A&M's 64-59 victory for the Big 12 tournament title game.
A&M tried to take away Riley's dribble penetration, forcing her to settle for contested shots on the perimeter.
"We have unbelievable warriors," Schaefer said. "Physically and mentally, they're as tough as any kids. I'll take them, and we'll play anybody anywhere right now, because they have got it hooked up."
The only team to score more than 60 points on A&M in the last 14 games was Oklahoma, which beat the Aggies 68-58 in Norman, Okla.
Blair has often leaned on a fast-paced style of play, but he says he gained a higher appreciation for defense when he hired Schaefer to join his Arkansas staff in 1997.
Schaefer, who graduated from Texas A&M in 1984, was head coach at Sam Houston State from 1990-97, earning Southland Conference coach of the year in 1996.
The two have combined for 10 postseason trips and 220 victories since the 1997-98 season.
"A lot of times we [verbally] coach, probably more so than any other coaching staff in America," Blair said. "We might be the odd couple. But it works."
The players agree.
"Coach Blair, he's soft. He's a sweet guy," A&M junior post La Toya Micheaux said. "Coach Schaefer is just hard-nosed. He's so adamant about everything he does, and he wants things perfect."
Schaefer often will have the defensive game plan rolled up, rested against his forehead on the bench with his head down if things aren't going well. He'll give instructions to players as they come out of the game, but he's most animated during practice.
"He's very demanding but a great coach," senior point guard A'Quonesia Franklin said. "He wants us to thrive for perfection. He thinks a perfect defense will create offense for us. He is so demanding, but that just makes us better players."
Better defense has indeed made scoring easier for the Aggies this season.
This is Blair's best offensive team at A&M. The Aggies are averaging 65.4 points per game, leaning on the experience of its top six players -- three seniors and three juniors -- and the versatility of his top scorers.
"We're not afraid to go to our other options," Blair said. "That's the key to good basketball teams. You need balance, and we do have balance."
A&M had four players score in double figures in back-to-back games for the first time this season at the Big 12 tournament. Four Aggies reached double figures against Iowa State in the semifinals, then four more reached them in the championship against Oklahoma State.
"When they get balanced scoring like they had [in the semifinals], and they defend like they do, they're tough to beat," Fennelly said.
Blair doesn't know how much longer his defensive coordinator will be around. Schaefer, as far as Blair is concerned, deserves a shot at a head coaching job.
"This is the best damn coach in America that has not had a chance to coach a major, major program," Blair said. "I don't want to lose him, but, yes, I want to lose him, because I would feel proud to see him take over a job and move it to the same level that we've moved Arkansas and Texas A&M to."
• Robert Cessna's e-mail address is robert.cessna@theeagle.com.
WOMEN'S BASKETBALL
NO. 2 TEXAS A&M VS. NO. 15 TEXAS-SAN ANTONIO
WHEN/WHERE: 11 a.m. Saturday at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center in Baton Rouge, La.
RECORDS: A&M (26-7), Texas-San Antonio (23-9)
TV/RADIO: ESPN2, Ch. 28/KZNE, 1150 AM
TEXAS A&M-UTSA LINEUPS
NO. 2 TEXAS A&M (26-7)
NAME POS. HT. CLASS PPG RPG
Takia Starks G 5-8 Jr. 16.9 4.5
A'Quonesia Franklin G 5-3 Sr. 7.7 *4.8
Patrice Reado F 6-0 Sr. 8.2 4.7
Danielle Gant F 5-11 Jr. 14.8 7.5
La Toya Micheaux C 6-3 Jr. 3.5 5.3
NO. 15 UTSA (23-9)
NAME POS. HT. CLASS PPG RPG
Onika Anderson F 5-10 Jr. 14.0 8.9
Terrie Davis G 5-8 Sr. 11.4 2.1
Monica Gibbs G 5-9 Jr. 11.1 7.4
Whitney York G 5-5 Fr. 9.8 2.5
Amanda Foster F 6-3 Sr. 8.2 6.4
*assists per game