Over the years, Shaylee Gonzales has experienced the madness of March a time or two. The sixth-year guard on the Texas women's basketball team spent her first four years at BYU before transferring to UT ahead of the 2022-23 season.

Gonzales missed the 2019-20 season with a knee injury, but she has made an appearance in the NCAA Tournament during each of her healthy years. Her BYU teams, however, never advanced past the second round even though she once scored 32 points as a freshman in a second-round game against Stanford. Last year, Texas was unceremoniously bounced by Louisville in the Round of 32.

That might explain why Gonzales told reporters earlier this month that reaching the Sweet 16 was a personal goal for her final season: "I want to make a run. Personally for me, I want to go farther than I've ever gone," she explained.

In Sunday's 65-54 win over Alabama, Gonzales played all 40 minutes and contributed five rebounds, two assists and three steals. That effort came two days after Gonzales led Texas past first-round foe Drexel with a 21-point performance at Moody Center.

With those two wins, Texas advanced to the Sweet 16 for the 18th time in school history. And Gonzales advanced for the first time in her history.

"I feel like it's hard to put it into words," she said Sunday night in the UT locker room. "I've always dreamed of being in this position and finally be able to get it, just prove all the hard work I've put in, the team's put in, the coaches put in."

For Gonzales, making the Sweet 16 is, well, sweet. But in the aftermath of the 11-point win over Alabama, she was ready to talk about her new goal.

Gonzales said No. 1-seeded Texas (32-4) is taking it "game by game." That next game will be a Sweet 16 showdown in Portland on Friday against either Utah or Gonzaga. If Texas wins, the Longhorns will advance to the Elite Eight at the Moda Center on Sunday.

"We're going to the Sweet 16, but we still have a farther goal. We want to go Final Four," Gonzales said. "We know that a lot of people have put us in that position on their brackets, we've got a lot of targets on our backs. We all have that one goal and we all want it really bad."

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Texas Longhorns guard Shaylee Gonzales finally reaches Sweet 16 round