From Underdogs to Destiny’s Darlings: How William & Mary Danced Into March Madness

The William & Mary women’s basketball team was ready to revel in its first-ever Coastal Athletic Association (CAA) championship—maybe too ready. With seconds ticking down and victory seemingly sealed, the Tribe bench erupted, players sprinting onto the floor, arms wide, emotions even wider.

One problem: the game wasn’t actually over. The buzzer sounded, but 0.4 seconds remained.

Cue the awkward retreat, sheepish grins, and a few “nothing to see here” expressions. But what’s a historic title run without a little extra drama? When the final buzzer sounded this time and Bella Nascimento tossed the ball high in the air, the celebration was official.

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William & Mary’s emotional, improbable ride to the top of the CAA ended with one final comeback—erasing a second-half double-digit deficit for the second time in three days to stun No. 3 Campbell, 66-63, in Sunday’s thrilling championship at CareFirst Arena.

No take-backs. No do-overs. Just pure, unfiltered joy—and a second chance to perfect the celebratory chaos. After all the adversity and obstacles, the Tribe didn’t mind.

As players, coaches, and staff jumped, danced, and hugged, fans behind the bench waved gold rally towels, shook pom-poms, and clapped in pure elation. They had just witnessed one of women’s college basketball history’s most magical, unexpected runs. William & Mary assistant coach Sugar Rodgers fell to her knees in elation at one point during the celebration. Some Tribe players wore looks of celebratory disbelief with one of them saying to her teammate, “I can’t believe this, oh my God.”

Believe it. This is real.

“I have been crying for like an hour,” William & Mary third-year head coach Erin Dickerson Davis said to The Next while wearing the net around her neck on the floor after her postgame presser. “I’m not a crier, but it’s been so many tough times. This is the definition — I was telling my staff — of falling down seven and getting up eight times. We literally lost seven of our last eight games, and everybody was spiraling out of control. We felt helpless and lost, and my friends were talking me off the ledge daily, reminding me that I was built for this and my staff that we were built for this. And we never quit. We never folded, and that’s what we kept saying: lose, but don’t fold. Let’s get ourselves up, and let’s play the next game. So, it’s been rough. It was a rough year, but this is so sweet because of all the hardships we’ve gone through.”

With the win, William & Mary, the CAA’s oldest school—a charter member since 1983—clinched its first-ever NCAA Tournament berth, securing the conference’s automatic bid. The Tribe (15-18 overall) will face High Point in a First Four matchup Thursday in Texas.

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The ninth-seeded William & Mary Tribe flipped the CAA bracket and became champions through the time-honored combination of faith, belief, and remaining united.

It also helped that William & Mary’s best player delivered in the biggest game of her life. CAA Most Outstanding Player Bella Nascimento, a talented and gifted two-sport athlete, also played volleyball at Manhattan before coming to William & Mary at the start of last season. She learned at a young age that persistence shapes greatness. That lesson was useful during the Tribe’s four-day blissful burst through the tournament.

Nascimento hugged everybody, yelled after every clutch basket, and tightly held her championship trophy and MOP plaque as she paraded the arena with a smile wider than the Anacostia River. She scored 20 of her career-high 33 points in the second half as the Tribe stormed back from a 51-38 deficit late in the third quarter. Nascimento, who also grabbed a career-best 11 rebounds, was an equal opportunity producer, scoring 10 points each in the third and fourth quarters. Eight of her points came in the final 5:50.

The way Nascimento smiled, posed for numerous photos while dancing with teammate Monet Dance on the floor, and raced up the ladder as the first player to cut the nets, she looked like she could play another game. But she finally revealed how her body felt after a grueling and exhausting but rewarding four days that nobody will ever forget.

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“First off, all praise to Most High because he helped us win this championship,” Nascimento told reporters at the postgame press conference. “Our bodies are fried in all types of ways. We just kept saying we’re not tired. Tired is mental; at the end of the day, who wants it more? We wanted this championship, and we just reminded each other to keep going because we can be tired tomorrow, and that’s what we kept saying in the locker room.”

Years from now, the legend of how the Tribe won four games, including one in overtime, in four days to become the first ninth-seed in CAA history to win the tournament will grow and be the fuel for every underdog moving forward. William & Mary beat No. 8 Hofstra, No. 1 North Carolina A&T, No. 4 Drexel, and No. 3 Campbell to complete a weekend masterpiece.

After all, William & Mary used the Delaware men as inspiration entering this tournament. The Blue Hens, a No. 12 seed, had ended the season losing six straight games before winning four games in four days and falling in the championship game to UNC Wilmington on the fifth day.  

In a season of turbulence, tension, and triumph, the Tribe stumbled into the CAA tournament with seven losses over its last eight games, including three by double digits to close the regular season. Two weeks ago, William & Mary scored 34 points in a humbling 20-point home loss to Hofstra.

The dream felt distant. The magic? Nowhere to be found.

And yet, in the way that only sports can script, something changed. The Tribe found its groove and a reservoir of confidence at the perfect time. Enter Hollywood because what William & Mary did usually happens in the movies.

“It’s March,” Dickerson Davis told reporters during the press conference. “None of that matters. How much you’ve won? How much you’ve lost. None of that matters. All you have to do is believe in us, believe in what we do, and we’ll come out on top. It doesn’t matter who we play or what seed. Nothing matters because it’s tournament time, and crazy things happen in March.”

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How else to explain how talented 5’3 sophomore guard Monet Dance, who made 18 3-pointers the entire season, making 13 triples over her first three games, including a CAA tournament seven threes against North Carolina A&T in a 75-65 overtime victory. Dance, who finished with a career-high 27 points against North Carolina A&T, started three games during her career before starting all four in this tournament.

Then there was 5’7 sophomore guard Cassidy Geddes, the team’s heartbeat, who had to watch the Drexel game from the sidelines after an injury took her out in the first half. She left the arena on crutches late Saturday, her status uncertain. But on Sunday, bruised, battered, and with a lot of tape on her ankle, she symbolized the program’s strength and toughness by gutting out 26 impactful minutes and finishing with 10 points. She buried a corner three-pointer to give William & Mary its first lead, 56-55, with 6:45 remaining.

“I knew that my trainer would get me right,” Geddes said exclusively to The Next as arena workers were dismantling the floor and seats while preparing to set up for another event. “I got about 10 pounds of tape on it today, and nothing kept me from playing in this game. Being strong and impactful would still lead us to where we wanted to be, so I had to show up for my team. Every moment helped us get to the point where we don’t regret any of it now. Even when losing games, we always knew that we were better than what we were showing; we just kept thinking we just got to weather the storm.”

Geddes’ resilience mirrored the journey of Dickerson Davis, who had spent years navigating the uncertainty of a profession that often tests the limits of perseverance. Dickerson Davis remained positive during a career that started in 2009 and included stops at Furman, La Salle, Illinois State, Towson, Georgetown, and Wake Forest before becoming the sixth head coach in W&M history.

She was rewarded earlier this year with a contract extension to 2029, but her road hasn’t been easy. She also had to overcome the challenge of balancing motherhood and coaching at a high level. Dickerson Davis remembered when former Towson head women’s basketball coach Niki Reid Geckeler gave her an opportunity and provided perfect mentorship.  

“Niki picked me up at Towson when I was pregnant, and when people told me that I could not have a baby and be a basketball coach,” Dickerson Davis told The Next. “She said, I will show you how to do this. I’m going to show you how you can be a wife and a mother and a damn good basketball coach.”

And now, emerging from the fire battle-tested and stronger while watching her jubilant players collapse into each other—laughing, screaming, crying, their bodies quaking with relief and disbelief—Dickerson Davis knew. She was also excited for her senior quartet of Nascimento, 6’1 center Kayla Beckwith, 5’11 forward Rebekah Frisby-Smith, and 6’0 forward Anahi-Lee Cauley to be able to experience this moment.

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“It’s so special,” Dickerson Davis said. “Between people doubting that I can do it, me doubting myself, wondering if I could do it. People were believing in me more than I believed in myself. It was just this balancing act daily with doubt, belief, and faith. That’s my story. You know, that was what it was meant to do. It was to test my faith, it was to show me that you can come out on the other side no matter what happens. It was trusting in the people beside you, trusting the people who believe in you, and never doubting yourself.”

William & Mary had every reason to give up, especially when Campbell swooshed to a 14-0 lead four minutes and 15 seconds into the game. Or when the Tribe shot 22.2% in the first quarter.

With bodies weary from the three challenging days, the Tribe could’ve acknowledged that this wasn’t their day, but Nascimento refused to let William & Mary quit. Playing the game of her life, she did it all. Dropped in a pair of three-pointers, scored tough layups, and sank a blizzard of mid-range shots, including one with nine seconds remaining that extended the Tribe’s lead to 66-63.

One of her 3-pointers was a one-handed heave off the glass from just inside half-court as the halftime buzzer sounded that pulled the Tribe to within, 34-26, at intermission.

Geddes is used to seeing spectacular scoring performances from Nascimento, but this was on another level.

“She was amazing,” Geddes said. “Seeing her hit all these big shots, I knew she would do it. I knew it was in every shot she took at the end before we even ran the play. I knew it was in, and I was worried about what I had to do on defense to ensure I did my job.”

Then, when Frisby-Smith, who added 12 points for the Tribe, swished a corner 3-pointer as the third-quarter buzzer sounded, the Tribe trailed 53-49 entering the fourth quarter. With new life, William & Mary pushed past the fatigue, outscoring Campbell, 17-10, in the fourth quarter.

William & Mary pushed past the doubt. Overcame the odds.

“We always believed,” Geddes said. “Every person in the locker room, every single coach, every single player, every single manager, there was never a doubt. When we went down 12 in the third quarter to the number one team, no one thought we would lose that game. We started terrible shooting-wise today. No one thought that we were going to lose. That belief drove us, and we could do anything we believed in.”

And Geddes had believed from the start.

“The coaches, when they recruited me, told me they wanted to make history. I came here because I wanted to be a part of a team that made history.”

Mission accomplished.

The Tribe had endured the lows. They may have stumbled into the tournament, but they created history, a lifetime of memories—and danced into destiny.

And this time, there was no false start.

“This is the fulfillment of that dream,” Geddes said, taking it all in while wearing her white championship hat and cool white CAA women’s basketball t-shirt over her green uniform. “It feels amazing. It feels unreal that we have done it. And now, we’re going to the NCAA tournament.”