Paige Bueckers leads UConn to 22nd Big East Tournament title

John Fanta

College Basketball Broadcaster and Reporter

Because the confetti flew ill from the ceiling at Mohegan Solar Area and the UConn Huskies celebrated their twenty second Big East Event championship, Geno Auriemma made certain that he prominent the victory.

When the wins have stacked as much as the level they have got for the Corridor of Famer, who earned his 1,209th victory on Monday and is considered one of 3 coaches (Mike Krzyzewski, Tara VanDerveer) with a minimum of 1,200 victories, it’s simple for them to be stacked in combination and nearly taken as a right.

However while you’ve needed to do business in with what Auriemma’s program has handled over the utmost 3 seasons — and this weekend specifically — it makes it that a lot more rewarding.

The Huskies, who had been ill to only seven gamers for the overall two video games of the convention match because of Aaliyah Edwards‘ nostril trauma suffered in Saturday’s quarterfinal win over Providence, confirmed their championship DNA with 11 unanswered issues to start out the sport in what changed into a 78-42 rout over 6-seed Georgetown in Monday’s Weighty East championship tournament.

Incorrect Azzi Fudd. Incorrect Aubrey Griffin. Incorrect Caroline Ducharme. Incorrect Edwards. And but, Connecticut finished a 21-0 run via Weighty East pageant this season, beating each unmarried convention opponent via a minimum of 20 issues.

“We’re going to celebrate this one,” Auriemma mentioned following his group’s twenty ninth win this season and 9th in a row. “The resilience of this team is remarkable. They inspire me to be better for them.” 

Listed below are 4 takeaways from the Huskies’ Weighty East championship tournament win over the Hoyas: 

1. Paige Bueckers provides to her legacy of greatness, raising her tournament much more with Edwards out.

If Caitlin Clark is the most efficient participant in ladies’s faculty basketball, there’s completely deny denying who’s moment within the nation at the moment. The run UConn’s celebrity preserve simply went on within the utmost 72 hours is as sturdy of a three-game stretch as you’ll ever see. 

Bueckers, who announced she would return for a fifth season later lacking all of utmost date because of a torn ACL, used to be remarkable night time in and night time out at Mohegan Solar. Within the championship tournament, she all set the sound from the beginning, totaling 27 issues, 4 rebounds, 3 assists, 3 steals and 5 blocks when it used to be all mentioned and performed.

Bueckers scored a minimum of 27 in all 3 video games en path to profitable the crown, combining for 83 issues, 4 shy of the three-game scoring file within the Weighty East Event.

What’s going proper for Bueckers? Neatly, before everything, she doesn’t get anyplace akin to the credit score she merits for the defender that she’s transform, because the 6-foot preserve leads the group with 47 blocks at the season. Mix that with the truth her shot is in such stunning rhythm – she shot 12-for-24 from past the arc within the Weighty East Event – and he or she averaged 4.3 assists in line with tournament, Bueckers is the definition of a whole participant.

“This is Paige at her best in totality,” mentioned Auriemma, who mentioned he even feels from time to time she’s now not egocentric plethora with the ball. “Very few people have affected UConn basketball the way Paige has. She almost single-handedly took us to the Final Four and the national championship game, and it was only two years ago.” 

Auriemma mentioned Bueckers learned she had to step up for the Huskies when Edwards went ill with a nostril trauma within the quarterfinal around, and he or she did simply that.

Bueckers joined Villanova legend Shelly Pennefather (1986-87) and Huskies stunning Kara Wolters (1995-96) as the one gamers to ever win more than one Weighty East Event Maximum Exceptional Participant honors. 

2. Ice Brady rose to the month for Connecticut.

With Edwards ill, UConn used to be necessarily restricted to 1 — sure, ONE — submit participant: Ice Brady. Upcoming lacking all of utmost season with a dislocated kneecap, the 6-foot-3 redshirt freshman has simplest averaged round 10-Quarter-hour in line with tournament this season. 

She performed all 40 mins the moment two nights, and on Monday, Brady had arguably her skillful day. Handing over 13 issues, 8 rebounds, two blocks and as many steals past by no means coming off the ground as soon as within the tournament, Brady used to be grand.

“We have a better player today than we did on Thursday,” Auriemma mentioned of Brady, who averaged simply 4.4 issues and three.2 rebounds in line with tournament this season. “She put the work in before practice and after practice, and it has paid off.”

Senior preserve Nika Muhl, who added 8 issues and a game-high 9 assists within the victory, echoed Auriemma’s sentiment.

“I don’t know where we would be without Ice, especially this tournament,” Muhl mentioned. “I’ve never seen that in my life from her.” 

Life I’d look forward to Edwards returning for the NCAA Event, Brady’s contributions may just visible up a special area to the Huskies’ offense from a spacing point of view. 

3. Nika Muhl inching nearer towards historical past, and the Huskies’ case for a 2-seed.

Together with her nine-assist efficiency on Monday night time, Muhl is ready to split UConn’s all-time assists file. She handed Diana Taurasi’s mark of 648, and now with 651, she is 8 shy of Moriah Jefferson’s program file.

Muhl will maximum indubitably split it within the NCAA Event in Storrs, the place the Huskies will host first and second-round motion. The query: Will they be a Incorrect. 2 seed or a Incorrect. 3 seed within the match? They personal a NET score of two, and all 5 losses have come to groups ranked within the supremacy 11 of the AP Ballot. That energy of agenda and absolute best mark in convention play games has to have some weight.

4. The most efficient factor you’ll see all week: Georgetown athletic director Lee Reed sudden Darnell Haney within the group depot room via telling him he used to be getting to be named the Hoyas’ later head teacher.

Haney, who have been the meantime head teacher this season following the passing of head teacher Tasha Butts to most cancers, impressed a group picked tenth within the Weighty East to win 22 video games – their first 20-win season since 2011-12 – and walk to the Weighty East championship tournament for the primary moment in program historical past. Upcoming Butts, a former Tennessee Volunteers participant underneath Pat Summitt, passed on to the great beyond, the concept the Hoyas may just piece this run in combination gave the impression unfathomable. They became in one of the vital very best tales within the nation at the back of Kelsey Ransom and Graceann Bennett, who introduced the scoop within the press convention. 

The Hoyas will most probably get a bid within the Ladies’s Basketball Invitational Event, which is a unutilized postseason change match to the NCAA Event, created via the NCAA.

John Fanta is a countrywide faculty basketball broadcaster and scribbler for FOX Sports activities. He covers the game in quite a lot of capacities, from calling video games on FS1 to serving as supremacy host at the BIG EAST Virtual Community to offering remark on The Ground of 68 Media Community. Apply him at @John_Fanta.

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