Let the Dance Begin: Scarlet and Black face Tigers on Saturday

SDSU will play LSU in the first round of the NCAA tournament

by Abigail Segoviano, Mundo Azteca Editor • March 17, 2025

The San Diego State University women’s basketball team reacts to the revealing of their opponent, No. 3 seed LSU, at the watch party on Sunday, March 16, 2025, at SDSU Fowler Athletic Center in San Diego.

The Mountain West Tournament champions punched their ticket to March Madness with a 72-68 win over Wyoming on Wednesday, March 12.

On Selection Sunday, it was announced that the Aztecs are part of the Spokane Regional 1 and landed a spot as the No. 14 seed. The Scarlet and Black awaited their matchup announcement.

“It feels amazing, a lot of emotions,” said the freshman guard Naomi Panganiban. “Our hard work has just came to show especially and yeah it feels really good.”

Head coach Stacie Terry-Hutson knew it would be down to two teams: LSU or Oklahoma.

“We started the preparation for LSU and Oklahoma because we figured we would be a 14 seed but you never know,” Terry-Hutson said. “I didn’t want to do too much and be wasteful but we did start watching and keeping an eye on them and again you know there’s no way you can stop anybody that’s playing in the NCAA right now but we’re just going to do our best to slow them down and figure out some ways we can be successful.”

San Diego State women’s basketball guards Veronica Sheffey and Naomi Panganiban speak to local media during the NCAA 2025 Selection Show. (Christie Yeung)

Junior guard Veronica Sheffey didn’t want to focus too much on who they would go against.

“We had our ideas of like who it could possibly be but we didn’t want to get too you know caught up in that,” Sheffey said. “Whoever we play we’re going to work as hard and have the same mindset going into whoever it is. You know it was a relief to finally find out who it was cuz we were kind of you know excited to find out finally but you know doesn’t change anything.”

Both the Aztecs and Terry-Hutson are no strangers to LSU. Terry-Hutson was an assistant coach for the Tigers from 2011-2013.

As for the Aztecs, they met LSU for the first time in the opening round of the 2012 NCAA Tournament, falling 64-56.

This marks SDSU’s 10th NCAA tournament appearance since 2012. With this being the Aztecs’ second time facing the Tigers, Terry-Hutson’s first as head coach, and a completely different roster from 12 years ago, they will be preparing for the No. 3 seed.

San Diego State women’s basketball head coach Stacie Terry-Hutson speaks to local media during the NCAA 2025 Selection Show. (Christie Yeung)

“They are a great basketball team and coached very very well,” Terry-Hutson said. We’re gonna have to really dial in…We’ll see what we can do to try to put ourselves in a situation to win on the road. We’re going to have to rebound and we’re going to have to get back in transition because they’re looking to push and they are very very good on the offensive glass so we need to spend a lot of time in the next couple of days blocking out.”

Aztecs will fly to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where tipoff is set on Saturday at 7:15 p.m. at Pete Maravich Assembly Center. Audiences can watch the game on ESPN.

“It’s been really fun just to say,” said Panganiban. “Long journey ever since the summer, we had all the pieces we needed and just keeping that together and the hard work that we put in the summer, non-conference, everything it’s just you know very exciting just to see what holds in store for us next.”

About the Contributors

Abigail Segoviano, ’24-25 Mundo Azteca Editor

Originally from Richmond, California, Abigail Segoviano is a second-year student, majoring in Journalism with a minor in Spanish. This is Abigail’s second year at the Daily Aztec where she got the opportunity to expand her writing skills as a journalist. As a staff writer last year she had the opportunity to mainly cover the entire season of women’s volleyball and also covered a couple of games for women’s basketball. This year her main focus is to branch out and write for different sports. Additionally to get involved in other sections such as Multimedia and Mundo Azteca. Abigail is the Vice President of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists (SDSU Chapter). Abigail received an award from The Daily Aztec: “Consistent Contributor.” In her free time, she enjoys reading, watching sports, listening to music, and going on adventures with friends.

Christie Yeung, ’24-25 News Editor

Born in Hong Kong, Christie Yeung is a first-generation transfer student who majors in journalism at San Diego State University. Prior to arriving at SDSU, she served as the Gaming/Tech Editor, Features Editor and Managing Editor of SAC Media at Mt. San Antonio College in Walnut, California where she was placed in on-the-spot competitions such as fourth in News photo, second in Portrait photo, first in Sports photo, first in Social Media and second in News writing, along with a meritorious mention in the Enterprise News Story/Series category from Journalism Association of Community Colleges. She was also awarded second in Best Breaking News Stories by the California College Media Association. During her free time, she likes to watch European soccer games, read, listen to Cantonese-pop music and play video games and Dungeons & Dragons with her online friends. She also has a sweet tooth and cannot turn away anything with Nutella in it.