It's been awhile since Tara VanDerveer has coached a women's college basketball national championship team. The last time was 1992, a quarter century ago, when she led Stanford over Western Kentucky for the Cardinal's second NCAA title in three years.

Since then she has coached the U.S. team to Olympic gold at the 1996 Summer Games in Atlanta and been inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2011.

And, oh yes, she's coached Stanford to 25 consecutive NCAA tournaments, during which her teams have advanced as far as four Sweet 16s, five Elite Eights, eight Final Four semifinals and two national championship games.

This season she upped her career win total to 1,012 to join the late Pat Summitt (1,098) as the only major college women's coaches with more than 1,000 victories.

Geno Auriemma, the maestro of Connecticut women's basketball, is right behind VanDerveer. He has 991 victories. More important, however, his teams have eviscerated VanDerveer's two national championships, winning 11 national titles. Twice, in 2008 and 2012, UConn defeated Stanford in a national championship game.

Come Sunday evening at American Airlines Center, VanDerveer and Stanford could get another shot at Auriemma and Connecticut in a national title game. First, however, there is the matter of Friday night's national semifinal games, when Stanford meets South Carolina and UConn plays Mississippi State.

The good news for VanDerveer and Stanford is that the coach says her latest edition of the Cardinal reminds her of her 1992 championship team -- a blue-collar, unselfish, no stars collection.

"We have players that are really good at certain things, and they've got to do those things," VanDerveer told the national media via conference call Tuesday. "But they understand their roles, and they embrace their roles. The unselfishness, just the team cohesiveness is something that you can't teach and you can't coach. It kind of has happened."

Don't be misled.

It's true that Stanford did not win the Pac-12 regular-season championship. It finished 15-3, one game behind Oregon State (16-2), but it did avenge two regular-season losses to the Beavers to beat Oregon State in the conference postseason title game.

And Stanford, which finished its regular season ranked sixth in the nation, has plenty of talent. That's how it got to 32-5, which includes NCAA tournament victories over unranked New Mexico State, No. 24 Kansas State, No. 14 Texas and No. 2 Notre Dame.

Erica McCall, a 6-3 senior forward who was a McDonald's high school All-America, averaged team-leading 14.4 points and 8.9 rebounds per game. Brittany McPhee, a 6-0 junior guard, averaged 13.4 points, and Karlie Samuelson, a senior and another 6-0 guard, averaged 12.8 points.

Eight players averaged at least 12 minutes per game.

"They play hard," VanDerveer said. "They're extremely unselfish. They're in the gym early. They don't care who gets credit. They are very excited for each other ... Different people are stepping up for us. That's why we're in the situation we're in."

That, of course, is deep into the hunt for a national championship.