On paper, the first half of Wednesday evening’s game looked like another regular Big East battle for the No. 5 UConn women’s basketball team. The Huskies led 41-26, shot 60.7% from the floor, forced 10 turnovers and outrebounded the Seton Hall Pirates by two.
Yet head coach Geno Auriemma was unsatisfied with his team’s overall effort during most of those 20 minutes.
“No momentum carried over into this game. No momentum at all,” Auriemma angrily told SNY at the intermission. “This is nonsense. … We have got a lot of work to do.”
The 40th-year head coach also felt frustrated about the number of fouls assessed in the first half. Even then, officiating was not as significant as how the Huskies played.
Connecticut committed eight turnovers and did not look like the same team that stunned the then-No. 4 South Carolina Gamecocks three days earlier. Remove a 12-0 first-quarter run, and the Huskies only outscored the Pirates by three.
But whatever Auriemma said in the locker room during the break worked.
UConn played much tougher in the second half as they pummeled the Pirates 91-49 at Walsh Gymnasium.
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The Huskies’ advantage hovered between 15 and 17 points until they ended the third quarter on a 15-3 run. Connecticut went on to outscore Seton Hall 50-23, outrebounded them 19-7 and had 11 assists on 16 field goals.
The Huskies looked much more dominant over the contest’s final 15.5 minutes. With the postseason looming, however, redshirt senior Paige Bueckers believes the team needs to maintain their intensity longer.
“Our response right away was not great in terms of starting out aggressive,” the Minnesota native said postgame. “It should not have to take us a half to really settle in and play our basketball, but the response in the second half is what we need to continue to move forward and do.”
Bueckers again flirted with a triple-double, but not without causing a scare. The two-time WBCA Coaches’ All-American landed a jumper right before the halftime buzzer. Immediately afterward, however, Bueckers held her right knee and hopped right to the locker room.
The two-time Big East Player of the Year quelled those fears when she started the third quarter on the court. Bueckers ultimately scored a game-high 23 points, grabbed nine rebounds, recorded five assists and collected two steals.
“She is one of the few players out there that you see, her head is always up and she sees everything that is going on,” The 11-time national champion coach said about Bueckers. “The more aggressive she is, the better our team is. … We count on her for a lot of things.”
Sophomore guard Ashlynn Shade picked up two fouls in less than five seconds in the first quarter. When she returned to the game in the third quarter, Shade looked and played much more aggressively. The reigning Big East Freshman of the Year’s defense alone played a pivotal role in shutting down the Pirates. It also helped Shade finish with 14 points, two steals and four boards.
Redshirt senior Aubrey Griffin provided an equally potent impact off the bench. 11 of her 15 points and four of her five rebounds came in the fourth quarter, but Griffin played tenacious basketball every second she spent on the court. UConn’s longest-tenured player strung together another masterful performance at Seton Hall, the alma mater of both her parents.
Auriemma also saw further development from a player working her way back from a torn ACL.
“Last January, before she got hurt, I thought she was playing the best basketball of her career,” the eight-time Naismith Coach of the Year commented about Griffin. “I do not know if she is there quite yet, but the more minutes that we can get her, she does make a difference. She is a difference-maker on our team.”
Two other players in the starting lineup also finished in double figures. Graduate guard Kaitlyn Chen dropped 21 points in 44 minutes when she squared off against the Pirates last season. This time around, Chen picked up 15 points on 6-7 shooting. Three-time Big East Player of the Week Sarah Strong, meanwhile, scored 10 points, grabbed five rebounds and had the game’s only block.
Three of Seton Hall’s four leading scorers accounted for nearly 80% of their entire offense. Maryland transfer Faith Masonius grabbed four rebounds and scored 12 points. Reigning Big East Freshman of the Week Jada Eads also had 12 points while recording two steals. No one had more points, however than Stamford native Yaya Lops. Facing a Connecticut school for the presumably final time, Lops shot 6-10 from the floor and 3-4 from downtown for 15 points.
The Pirates grabbed an early 5-0 lead that the Huskies quickly countered with five straight two-point field goals. Yet even with that efficient stretch, each team had 10 points following Amari Wright’s free throws.
Over the next two minutes, however, UConn looked like the team that crushed the Gamecocks on the road. The Huskies, defensively, forced three Seton Hall turnovers and held them to a single shot attempt. On offense, meanwhile, consecutive three-pointers from Bueckers and Shade forced a Pirates timeout.
But Seton Hall swung back. Eads and Lops got the Pirates within seven and held Connecticut’s offense scoreless over the last 2:40 of the opening quarter. The Huskies shot 0-2 from the floor in that span and 0-2 in the opening 2.5 minutes of the second period. Seton Hall pulled within two points of UConn before Strong ended the visitors’ five-minute scoring drought with a layup.
It sparked an 11-2 run that lasted until the media timeout. Chen answered the first-year guard’s jumper with a triple that put the Huskies back up by double figures. While they shot 2-6 across the last four minutes, Connecticut still took a 15-point advantage into the locker rooms.
The Pirates kept the margin that close for the first four minutes of the second half. After that back-and-forth stretch, however, the Huskies’ backcourt put the game away. Three graduate students and the Indiana native scored 18 of UConn’s next 20 points while consistently utilizing the fast break. Seton Hall mustered just three points in that span and fell behind by 32 after three quarters.
As she did in the Huskies’ previous Big East battle a week ago, Griffin took over the final frame. The 2023 All-Big East Honorable Mention scored 11 of the team’s 21 points as Connecticut secured their 15th conference victory.
The Huskies’ three-game road trip concludes against the Butler Bulldogs at Hinkle Fieldhouse late Saturday afternoon. Tip-off is at 4:30 p.m. EST on SNY.
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