WNIT success sweet for up-and-coming NU

A couple of weeks ago, Amy Jaeschke spent the better part of a Monday night in front of her computer clicking away like crazy.

"I just kept hitting the refresh button, over and over again," said Jaeschke, a former basketball star at New Trier who is now an all-Big Ten center at Northwestern. "I just kept waiting and waiting to see if our name popped up on the bracket."

That's how teams hoping for a spot in the Women's NIT postseason tournament find out if they're in or not. Unlike the NCAA Tournament, there is no made-for-TV selection show with interviews, highlights and analysis.

Selection Monday for the WNIT is rather unceremonious in comparison.

But I dare say that Jaeschke and the Wildcats could have cared less. The only thing they cared about was seeing "Northwestern" appear in that bracket on the computer screen.

A berth in a postseason tournament had been a long time coming. A very, very long time.

"We were so excited when it popped up," Jaeschke said. "Everyone was texting each other."

Unfortunately, with a loss to Big Ten rival Michigan on Thursday, the Wildcats' ride through the WNIT is over. But not before they got three rounds in (the Sweet 16), and, more importantly, laid the groundwork for real change in a program that has been craving it for years.

"I think it's sinking in finally," Jaeschke said. "We're really starting to realize how far this program has come."

Like the Northwestern men, who experienced a long-awaited revival this season, the women have been down and out for quite some time.

This year's WNIT berth was the program's first postseason appearance in 13 unlucky years.

Actually, unlucky doesn't even begin to describe the Wildcats since then.

This is a program that for the last decade was averaging 6 wins a season and had won only 14 Big Ten games. Total. Included were two winless Big Ten seasons and two 1-win Big Ten seasons.

Then Joe McKeown was hired as head coach in 2008.

He was sailing right along enjoying a very successful tenure at George Washington, a perennial top 25 team that made NCAA appearances a yearly tradition.

But, when the opportunity for the most challenging assignment of his career presented itself, he took the leap and moved to Evanston.

Last season, the Wildcats won seven games under McKeown.

This year, that number jumped to 18, including 7 in the Big Ten, the most in 13 years. Along the way, the Wildcats beat NCAA Tournament teams such as DePaul, Iowa and Wisconsin.

"When I got here, we needed to change the culture, there had been 10 straight years of finishing last in the Big Ten," McKeown said. "To win 18 games, to get to the Sweet 16 of the WNIT, to beat Top 20 teams like DePaul, it's all just a springboard to creating a totally different atmosphere here about women's basketball."

There are also now totally different expectations for the Wildcats.

McKeown wants an NCAA berth next year, and why not?

The only significant player Northwestern loses is starter Kristin Cartwright, daughter of former Bulls center Bill Cartwright. But she averaged only 7 points per game.

Jaeschke, who averaged 17 points and led the Big Ten in blocks (3.2 bpg) for much of the season, will be back and so will Kendall Hackney and Dannielle Diamant, two highly touted freshmen who lived up to their billing and should be even better with a year of experience.

Plus, McKeown, a charming recruiter, inked three high-impact players in Mylan Woods, La'Terria Taylor and his daughter Meghan.

Woods was just named the player of the year in Ohio, Taylor is a star at Von Steuben in the city and Meghan is a sharpshooter out of a good program at Loyola.

"We're receiving interest from kids all over the country now," McKeown said. "We're excited about next year. Things are really changing here."