In 2016, Breanna Stewart, Moriah Jefferson and Morgan Tuck closed their collegiate careers with their fourth-straight national championship.
Since then, the UConn Women’s Basketball team has reached seven Final Fours. The first six times, the Huskies went home without an NCAA trophy.
On the seventh try, Connecticut ended their nine-year drought and capped off Paige Bueckers’ college career with a title.
The No. 2-seed Huskies captured their 12th national championship as they clobbered the No. 1-seed South Carolina Gamecocks 82-59 in Tampa.
“I am glad they [the players] were rewarded,” head coach Geno Auriemma, who had tears welling up in his eyes throughout the postgame celebrations, said afterward. “This was one of the more emotional Final Fours and more emotional national championships that I have been a part of since that very first one.”
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Bueckers recorded 17 points, six rebounds, three assists and two blocks in her final collegiate game. The Wade Trophy winner let the tears out when she exited and embraced Auriemma on the sidelines with 1:32 remaining. Bueckers explained how she tried to encapsulate each relationship she had in a five-second hug.
Capturing that elusive national title involved traversing a winding road.
“It has been a story of resilience, of gratitude, of adversity, of overcoming adversity, just responding to life’s challenges and trying to fuel them to make me a better person, a better player,” the three-time Big East Player of the Year stated. “To be rewarded with something like this, you cannot really even put it into words.”
For all of the accolades Bueckers accumulated in college, there is one that she will never claim: Final Four Most Outstanding Player.
That honor instead went to her longtime teammate Azzi Fudd, who nearly quadrupled her point total from the last Final Four she played in. Fudd, who dominated the first half of Friday’s national semifinals, took total control with 24 points on 9-17 shooting, five rebounds and three steals.
“We as coaches felt like Azzi [Fudd] was the key to the tournament,” the 40th-year head coach commented. “Azzi became the focal point for us of who has to really step up tonight, and she did magnificently.”
The Big East All-Tournament Team guard’s formula for being Connecticut’s focal point required an additional ingredient: positivity.
“I play my best when I am having fun,” Fudd explained. “To have fun with all of them, it was exactly what I wanted. Shots will fall, shots will not fall, but I knew I was going to give it my all. … Everything I could control, I knew I was going to do the best I could.”
WBCA Freshman of the Year Sarah Strong had as many points as the redshirt junior while grabbing 15 rebounds and rejecting three shots.
UConn’s three superstars, all former No. 1 recruits, guided them to a national championship like they did in 2016 and 2009. The Huskies’ big three did not complete the climb back to the top of the college basketball mountain by themselves, however.
Connecticut’s stud sophomores, KK Arnold and Ashlynn Shade, provided pivotal support off the bench. Shade only had four points, but her corner three before halftime gave the Huskies a double-digit lead that never diminished. Arnold, meanwhile, took over the final frame with eight of her nine points and two of her three assists coming in that period.
Every Gamecock who played scored, but no one had more than 10 points. Tessa Johnson and Joyce Edwards each crossed double figures while snagging eight total rebounds. Sania Feagin scored eight points on 4-6 shooting. MiLaysia Fulwiley and Chloe Kitts each picked up nine points while combining for eight boards and five assists.
Both teams looked like the sport’s titans early on, seldom going multiple possessions without one of them burying a bucket. The Gamecocks twice grabbed a three-point lead in the first four minutes; the Huskies struck back and took it from them both times.
Connecticut went on a 7-0 run following South Carolina’s second three-point edge behind their effective interior play. Edwards ended that run, but not long after the media timeout, Fudd pickpocketed Fulwiley near midcourt and landed a layup. The Huskies’ defense intensified their pressure after that fast-break field goal, forcing five straight missed shots from the Gamecocks. Bueckers concluded the quarter with a floater five seconds before the buzzer as UConn grabbed a 19-14 advantage.
The Huskies added two more buckets before South Carolina’s star first-year student ended their five-minute scoring drought. Edwards’ second-chance hook shot sparked an 8-2 Gamecocks run that cut the deficit from nine points to as little as three.
But the three-time Gatorade Washington, D.C., Player of the Year spearheaded Connecticut’s counterpunch midway through the second quarter. Fudd scored six of the Huskies’ next eight points, and her second scoop-and-score resulted in the team’s first double-digit lead. South Carolina scored four points off two UConn giveaways, but Shade’s corner three-pointer made it a 36-26 game at the intermission.
Unlike Saturday, when she took just one shot, the Virginia native highlighted the Huskies’ offense in the second half. Fudd had Connecticut’s first points and first field goal of the third quarter, helping her pick up a 20-piece before the media timeout.
That was when the Gamecocks’ sensational sophomore, who did not score in the first half, got much more involved. Fulwiley landed a second-chance floater, then poked the ball out of Ice Brady’s hands for a Feagin fast-break layup.
That sequence forced a timeout from Auriemma. It allowed the Huskies’ 5-foot-11 guard to halt South Carolina’s comeback attempts with a corner three-pointer off an inbounds play. Strong subsequently buried a deep three-pointer with a defender in front of her. A series of free throws resulted in a 62-42 UConn lead after three quarters.
Arnold, who scored six points in the first four minutes of the fourth period, helped stretch the Huskies’ advantage to 30. The 6-foot-2 first-year forward in Strong landed a layup for Connecticut’s final field goal of the season with 2:58 remaining. Another minute passed before she and most of the starters checked out to a rousing ovation.
South Carolina closed the national championship game on an 11-2 run, but that only allowed them to trim their deficit to 23. The pack of Huskies swarmed near their bench when the buzzer sounded, officially securing their second national championship as a No. 2 seed.
“We felt like we were so connected and nothing could break us,” Bueckers expressed about the squad’s chemistry afterward. “To be able to sit up here with the whole team and share this moment is extremely validating.”
UConn concludes its 2024-25 campaign with a 37-3 record, the same one the 2023-24 UConn men’s basketball team had last season. The 37 wins mark the most the Huskies earned since they went 38-0 in 2015-16, Stewart’s senior year.
Aubrey Griffin, Connecticut’s longest-tenured player, suffered a litany of injuries throughout her six seasons in Storrs. For the Ossining, New York, native, particularly, culminating her collegiate career with a national championship made those experiences “worth it.”
“It feels great. I cannot even explain the emotions that I am feeling right now. It is a lot,” Griffin told SNY’s Chelsea Sherrod postgame. “I am super excited and super grateful even given the opportunity to play in this game.”
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