BATON ROUGE, La — The parallel lives of Penn State coach Coquese Washington and LSU coach Nikki Caldwell are about to cross paths again, with a guarantee that one of them will reach uncharted territory in their up-and-coming coaching careers.

Washington, in her fifth season as a head coach, and Caldwell, in her fourth, are no strangers to the second round of the NCAA tournament, in which they’ll meet Tuesday night when the fourth-seeded Lady Lions (25-6) play the No. 5 seed Lady Tigers (23-10).

Neither has coached a third-round game yet, though it would seem that both will have plenty more chances to take their teams on deep runs in March.

“It’s like our generation that’s coming into play as far as coaches, and it’s exciting to be able to go against people that you played against,” said Caldwell, a former player at Tennessee.

Penn State advanced to the second round of last year’s tournament, while Caldwell coached UCLA to the second round the past two seasons before being hired away by LSU.

It’s clear that Caldwell, 39, and Washington, 41, have gained rapid respect from some of more tenured coaches in women’s basketball. San Diego State coach Beth Burns called them “the future of our game,” before her Aztecs fell to LSU in the tournament’s opening round.

Caldwell and Washington met three times as players from 1991-93, with the Lady Vols beating Washington’s Notre Dame squad each time.

Both coaches described each other as fierce competitors, but also as friends. When they had a chance to chat after Penn State had arrived in Baton Rouge last weekend, they spent more time comparing their experiences as mothers than as coaches.

“We were talking about babies and newborns and nursing, and some other stuff that maybe men don’t want to hear about,” Washington said, grinning. “She said she had a pretty good pregnancy. I said, `Well, I threw up every day for five months, so God bless you.’ It’s tough (being pregnant while coaching), but it’s certainly a joyous time when you have a newborn. ... So we weren’t talking basketball at all. We were sharing new mother stories.”

Washington has two children, a 6-year-old boy and 2-year-old girl, and her second pregnancy overlapped one of her first few seasons as a head coach. Caldwell was pregnant through most of this season, her first at LSU. She never missed a game and gave birth to a girl about two weeks ago, in between the end of the Southeastern Conference tournament and beginning for the NCAA tournament.

“We appreciate everything that basketball has brought to our lives, but being a mother is on a whole other level,” Caldwell said. “So it’s great to share that experience with Coquese, and obviously I wish her team much luck in (Tuesday) night’s game as well.”