Redshirt junior Paige Bueckers scored her 1,000th career point against the then-No. 24 North Carolina Tar Heels at Mohegan Sun Arena on December 10, 2023. It took Bueckers 55 games to become the 52nd player in UConn women’s basketball history to reach the milestone.
Only one person in the program’s existence completed that feat in as few contests. That person was Maya Moore, who also crossed that number in 55 games and hit it in the state of Connecticut. Moore, a member of the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame Class of 2024, went on to score 3,036 points in 154 collegiate games from 2007 to 2011. She remains the only UConn player with 3,000+ points almost 15 years later.
Bueckers, a rising redshirt senior, currently has 1,683 points in 85 career contests. That is good for 20th all-time behind two-time national champion Ann Strother (1,699) and ahead of Vanderbilt Commodores head coach Shea Ralph (1,678). With at least one season remaining before she departs for the Women’s National Basketball Association, how close could the Minnesota native get to the four-time Associated Press All-American’s scoring record?
Firstly, it is slightly possible that Bueckers breaks Moore’s all-time mark in just one season. If she were to do so, however, the 2021 National Player of the Year would need to score 1,354 total points across the entire year and average at least 32. Every player in Division I women’s basketball history who has scored 1,000+ points in a single season averaged no more than 31.7 points per game. Caitlin Clark, the only women’s basketball player to score 1,000 points in more than one campaign, holds the single-season record with 1,234.
Bueckers led the team in scoring with a career-high 21.9 points per game and 854 total points during her redshirt junior campaign. Despite averaging 32.8 minutes, the two-time Big East Player of the Year has not had a 40-point performance in any of her 85 collegiate contests. Moore, a two-time Naismith Player of the Year, has done so multiple times. The Missouri native crossed the 1,000-point mark with a 40-piece against the Syracuse Orange in 2009 and dropped 41 versus the Florida State Seminoles in 2010.
Scoring as many points as Moore and Bueckers each have requires shooting the ball at a highly efficient rate. It is worth noting that both stars average exactly 5.6 two-pointers and 2.0 threes a night, but their clips are slightly different. Moore shot 52.5% from the field and 40.4% from downtown in her four years in Storrs. Bueckers is shooting 53% from the floor and 42.5% from behind the arc (on 391 attempts) in her career. The rising redshirt senior has also made more free throws at an 83.3% clip than the 2024 Women’s Basketball Hall of Famer did.
Grabbing rebounds, especially on the offensive end, is just as critical to scoring as being productive from the field. Moore was lethal on the glass in college, averaging 8.3 boards in her career and three seasons with more than eight per game. 2.6 of those resulted in second-chance opportunities. Although she spent part of this past season at the power forward position, Bueckers has averaged just 4.8 rebounds in college. Only 0.6 of those boards came on the offensive glass. Those are still strong numbers for a guard of her caliber; the two-time WBCA All-American finished third on the team in that category.
The two-time Big East Player of the Year complements her rebounding by being a pest in transition. At 2.1 steals per game, Bueckers is averaging around the same number of steals in three seasons as the Lawrenceville, Georgia, native did. Not every steal that they commit leads to a bucket, but creating more possessions with a tight defense plays a role in any team’s offensive success.
With the talent she possesses, Bueckers could finish the 2024-25 season within approximately 500 points of Moore’s mark. Given how she has developed during her collegiate career, the Minnesota native is bound to build off her numbers from this past season. If the 2021 National Player of the Year exceeds her 854 points as a redshirt junior, placing in the top five in program history in that category is within reason.
The Minnesota native is going to continue taking over games, even with the current and incoming talent around her, including two six-time Big East Freshmen of the Week winners. She did so on both ends of the floor multiple times last year, regardless of how many available players the Huskies had. Moore went through the same thing, minus the extensive injury issues Connecticut has sustained over the past three years.
No more than three of her teammates averaged double figures in each of the two-time Wooden Award winner’s final three seasons in Storrs. Out of the 116 games she played in that span, Moore dropped 30+ in just 10 of them. Bueckers, who only had two teammates who averaged 10+ points (minimum 25 games played) as a sophomore and redshirt junior, scored 30+ eight times in three years. Neither of them has had to truly carry the Huskies’ offense, but their contributions to the game are loud at any decibel level.
Maya Moore and Paige Bueckers are both special superstars in UConn’s illustrious and remarkable history. Both No. 1 recruits out of high school are very efficient scorers from anywhere on the floor, tenacious rebounders and difficult defenders for any opponent to handle. The two have combined for six WBCA All-American honors, three Naismith Player of the Year awards and three Wooden Awards, just to name a few accolades.
There is no doubt that Bueckers’ name will be uttered in the same sentence as Moore’s for the rest of time as the best scorers in team history. Although she is still in search of that elusive national championship, the Minnesota native has cemented herself as one of the program’s all-time greats.
How close she gets to, if not surpasses, Moore’s all-time scoring record is still to be determined.
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