'Time to dance': Texas women's basketball clinches second seed in NCAA Tournament

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The Texas Longhorns women's basketball team breaks out in celebration after they learn their NCAA Tournament fate. | Twitter/Texas Women's Basketball

Experiencing the natural high from winning the Big XII title on Sunday, it was fitting the Texas Longhorns women's basketball learned their March Madness fate more than 30,000 feet from the ground.

Head coach Vic Schaefer and the program were flying home to Austin from Kansas City where the Longhorns had vanquished Baylor when the NCAA Division I Women's Basketball Committee announced that Texas will be entering the 2022 NCAA Women's Basketball Tournament as the second seed in the Spokane Region.

And of course, the team filled their plane with cheers and yells.

"Time to dance," the program's official Twitter account proclaimed.

The Longhorns will open the tournament against Fairfield on March 18, the Austin American-Statesman reported.

Though the program had played its final game at Erwin Center toward the end of its regular season, a win over the Stags would guarantee Texas another last hurrah for the venue nicknamed "The Drum."

Erwin Center will play host to a second-round game, its last-ever basketball game, the Austin American-Statesman reported.

Texas takes an 11-game winning streak into the postseason. 

The 67-58 win over Big XII and I-35 rival Baylor on March 13 was the 11th victory, according to the Austin American-Statesman.

The Texas-Fairfield matchup will be the first-ever meeting between the two programs.

The Stags captured the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference title.

Under Schaefer, this is the second consecutive tournament berth since he took the reins in 2020, the Austin American Statesman reported. 

Last year, the sixth-seeded Longhorns advanced to the Elite Eight for the second time in half a decade.