Redshirt sophomore Ice Brady received a pass from the perimeter 40 seconds into Tuesday night’s contest. She instantly tossed it out to sophomore guard Ashlynn Shade, who had nobody guarding her from beyond the three-point line.
From the moment the ball left Shade’s hands, nothing could stop the No. 4 UConn women’s basketball team’s offense. The reigning Big East Freshman of the Year landed that triple, then another two possessions later, and another after that. Shade went nuclear, making each of her first seven shot attempts for 20 first-quarter points against the Iowa State Cyclones.
Big East Player of the Week winners Paige Bueckers and Sarah Strong provided four more triples of their own in the frame. That adds up to 10 buckets from behind the arc in the first quarter, though that only accounted for half of UConn’s game total.
The Huskies buried a school-record 20 three-pointers and had three players with 27+ points as they crushed Iowa State 101-68 at Mohegan Sun Arena.
UCONN BASKETBALL MESSAGE BOARD | THE HUSKY HOUSE FORUM | UCONN BASKETBALL 2025 RECRUITING CLASS | UCONN FOOTBALL RECRUITING
Connecticut entered Tuesday’s contest averaging 79 points per game. While it might not have been a Christmas present from the players, it certainly surprised the 2006 Basketball Hall of Fame inductee.
“I really did not expect this,” Auriemma commented postgame.
Cyclones head coach Bill Fennelly, meanwhile, could only shake his head when reflecting on what the Huskies did from downtown.
“I have never seen a team shoot it like that,” Fennelly remarked. “The way they shot the ball was unlike anything I have seen in a long time.”
The La Lumiere School alum did not score much outside of her insane first quarter. Nevertheless, Shade still dropped a career-best 27 points and made seven triples. Tuesday night marked the first time that the Indiana native picked up more than 15 points since the first weekend of last year’s NCAA Tournament.
Auriemma hopes it spurs her continuing development into a scoring specialist.
“[Shade] was a really confident high school player who thought she could make any shot any time,” Auriemma said about Shade. “I am hoping she remembers that.”
If the 5-foot-10 sophomore shined in the first quarter, then Bueckers dominated the second. UConn only scored 18 points in that period, but the two-time Big East Player of the Year had half of them at a 50% clip. Like Shade, Bueckers made her first four shots from behind the arc, had 10 field goals and finished with 27 points.
Strong, the Basketball Hall of Fame Women’s Showcase’s MVP, took over after halftime. The four-time Big East Freshman of the Week scored 17 of her career-high 29 points on 6-9 shooting in the final 20 minutes. Strong already had 12 points at intermission, but her second-half performance secured the fourth 20-point game of her young career.
The Huskies’ offense ran extremely smoothly at Mohegan Sun Arena. Nine of Connecticut’s 10 available players scored and grabbed a rebound. Brady had three points and three boards while collecting four steals. Seven different Huskies also recorded multiple assists, which included graduate guard Kaitlyn Chen’s eight in 23 minutes.
Iowa State had an effective offense that scored relatively often, but not necessarily at the same level as UConn’s. Despite their 33-point defeat, the Cyclones shot 46% from the floor, scored 32 points in the paint and went 8-25 from behind the arc.
Junior Sydney Harris had five of Iowa State’s triples and a season-high 17 points off the bench. Kansas natives Addy Brown and Emily Ryan each recorded nine points and six dimes, while all six of Arianna Jackson’s points came from long range.
Most of the attention going into the Basketball Hall of Fame Women’s Showcase revolved around Strong and sophomore center Audi Crooks, though. Crooks entered Uncasville, Connecticut, as the nation’s 10th-leading scorer at 21.6 points a night. The 6-foot-3 center stayed right around her season average with 22 points, 11 in each half, while hauling in six rebounds.
Crooks struck first with a second-chance layup 28 seconds into the game, but Shade quickly countered with eight points in 61 seconds. Although the Big 12 All-Tournament Team center ended that run after spinning past several Huskies defenders, the Indiana native remained white-hot from the perimeter.
Strong stopped the sophomore boxing match after four minutes when she shot 1-2 from the charity stripe. Another three minutes passed before neither those two second-year students nor Bueckers buried a bucket. The Minnesota native made her own two triples on consecutive possessions 53 seconds after the one-time Big East Player of the Week’s free throw.
Shade made two more three-pointers to finish off her 20-point period; with the second of those two putting Connecticut ahead 36-10. The 2022 Indiana Girls Basketball Gatorade Player of the Year’s first miss came 10 seconds into the second period. Bueckers remained in control with two more field goals, but as the Huskies cooled down from long range, Iowa State’s offense woke up.
Harris buried all three of the Cyclones’ first-half triples in 2.5 minutes. The latter two of the Illinois native’s shots from downtown came during an 11-0 Iowa State run. UConn quickly countered with a 7-0 run and ultimately took a 19-point halftime lead into the locker rooms.
Strong shut down a potential Cyclone comeback in the third quarter. The McDonald’s All-American Game co-MVP scored at least five straight Huskies’ points on two separate occasions. Fennelly called his third timeout following the latter of those two stretches.
Strong’s third quarter helped her shatter her career high in points. Shade, likewise, broke her personal best with two more buckets in the final frame. Allie Ziebell’s triple near the corner established a new school record for Connecticut. Morgan Cheli’s three-pointer from nearly the same spot helped the Huskies cross the century mark for the first time this season.
UConn faces one more non-conference challenge before their Christmas break. It is a significant one: an Elite Eight rematch with the No. 7 USC Trojans at the XL Center Saturday night. Tip-off from Hartford is at 8 p.m. on Fox.
--------------------------------------------------------------
• Subscribe to our YouTube Channel
