Aari McDonald has been there before.
A transfer from Washington, McDonald knows the feeling of playing against her former team. She’s done it four times since arriving at the UA in 2017 — five if you count the time the Wildcats and Huskies played during her NCAA-mandated redshirt year.
However, McDonald has never faced a situation quite like what teammate Bendu Yeaney is experiencing now. Yeaney will play against her former team, Indiana, on Monday night with a chance to make the Final Four.
The No. 3-seeded Wildcats (19-5) will take on the No. 4-seeded Hoosiers (21-5) at 6 p.m. inside San Antonio’s Alamodome.
Both teams pulled upsets in the round of 16, with Arizona handling No. 2 seed Texas A&M 74-59 and Indiana holding off top-seeded N.C. State 73-70.
Indiana and Arizona have taken similar tracks, although the Hoosiers had a head start. They won the WNIT title in 2018 and went to their first NCAA Tournament the following year. Arizona won its WNIT championship in 2019 and would have made the Big Dance last year, if it hadn’t been canceled.
McDonald has some advice for Yeaney, a guard who is averaging 4.1 points, 3.0 rebounds and 1.4 assists per game in her first season at the UA.
“It’s going to be a war — no easy buckets. It’s going to be a physical game and you’ve just got to play your game,” she said. “Don’t try to do too much. I know with the adrenaline you may be like, ‘Ah, I got to make a play; like I got to do something big.’ Just play your game — let the game come to you and just trust in your abilities and trust in your teammates.”
In the locker room following Saturday’s win, Yeaney called the showdown with the Hoosiers “another game.”
Yeaney spent three seasons at Indiana, winning the WNIT as a freshman and as a sophomore advancing to a second-round NCAA Tournament game against Oregon. Yeaney tore her Achilles tendon in that tournament game. She rushed her comeback the following season, and played in just six games before deciding to transfer.
Bendu Yeaney won a WNIT championship and played in the NCAA Tournament with Indiana before leaving for Arizona.
Yeaney was not fully recovered from her injury when she chose the UA. Her new school provided healing in more ways than one.
For starters, the UA was closer to her Portland home. And her new coach, Adia Barnes, had known Yeaney for years. The two first met when Yeaney was in junior high.
“I wanted Bendu the first time recruiting. (I’ve) known her since she was in eighth grade, watched her and then I was surprised when she went all the way across the country to Indiana,” Barnes said.
“It’s funny because she came on a visit when I first got the job (at Arizona) — we just we weren’t a good program at that time, so she went to a more successful program.”
The second time around, Barnes wasted no time.
“I’m a big relationship person: I knew her. I knew her characteristics, her work ethic. I knew that she could help us,” she said. “It was amazing getting her back. She has helped us tremendously.”
Yeaney broke into the starting lineup in the fourth game of Arizona’s season and hasn’t looked back.
She sparks her team by playing aggressively on both ends of the court.
In three NCAA Tournament games, she has scored 14 points, dished 10 assists and added five steals and a key block.
Yeaney seems to know when her team needs to get going on offense. Against Texas A&M, she kicked off UA’s third-quarter roll with a 3-pointer — just her eighth this season — and a layup.
Arizona’s Benduy Yeaney won a WNIT title and an NCAA Tournament game at Indiana before leaving to come to Tucson.
While Yeaney might have a little inside information heading into Monday’s game, Barnes isn’t asking her for a scouting report.
“I want her to just focus and have fun and do her thing,” Barnes said. “I think for her you know playing against her former team is obviously … Players always get excited to play against their former teams or who recruited them that’s just the way kids are, but Bendu has been amazing for us.”
In October, Yeaney was granted a waiver to play right away rather than sit a year. At the time, she envisioned Arizona playing in the NCAA Tournament. There was no way of knowing the road would include a clash with her former school.
“I know that’s my old school and I’ll have some teammates on there, but we’re just going to take it as another game — we’re trying to fight for a Final Four spot,” Yeaney said. “That’s all it is.”
