How UConn women’s basketball has fallen short of expectations

The 68-year-old Auriemma entered his 38th season, a season lined up to maximize the team’s potential. Paige Bookers Sharing the backcourt, Azzie Fudd pours the Huskies into another Final Four, thinking she has all the pieces to celebrate where the past handful of seasons have ended in bitter disappointment.

Maybe UConn still has those parts.However Bookers’ torn ACL to persist in July, she will miss the season. This is a roadblock that UConn has been able to avoid frequently.

Breanna Stewart came out in 2012 with plans to win four championships in four seasons. She did just that. The next wave of recruits, including Crystal Dangerfields, Kristin Williams and Olivia Nelson Ododus, did what most of her UConn players since the mid-1990s left without a single title. did.

Now UConn is preparing for five months of basketball without Buckers, who has won every major national tournament. Received the Player of the Year award as a freshman But I never climbed a ladder or cut the net as a college player. She will miss most of her sophomore season with her knee injury and will miss her entire junior season with another injury.

Of course, this is not how everyone created the blueprint for 2022-23. Again, it generally reflects the tenuous nature of high-level sports and the bumps along the road that UConn found very easy to navigate for a very long time.

“Whatever Plan A is, it’s very rare that it actually happens the way you want it to,” said Auriemma. “Our problem is that many of our Plan A Sometimes it happened, but I appreciate it more when it happens.”

He played flawlessly in the 2016-17 season, pushing UConn’s winning streak to 111. Overtime buzzer with Morgan Williams jump shot.

UConn remained undefeated in the 2017-18 season until they lost the National Semifinals to an overtime buzzer beater. This is by Alike Ogamboiret of Notre Dame.

Huskies lead Ireland by 9 points with less than 8 minutes remaining 2019 final four However, another semi-final defeat faded the stretch.

The 2020 NCAA Tournament was canceled due to the pandemic, and UConn turned over the wet COVID cardboard for 2020-21. just upset about arizona.

The Huskies dealt with an unprecedented string of injuries last season. Minneapolis, UConn lost in national tournament For the first time in history, they moved to South Carolina to enter this season as the clear favorite to repeat as champions.

Six years without a national championship? Another elite program with another iconic coach, Stanford has 28 years between the 1992 and 2021 titles. That’s a healthy take. Still, returning to status as another member of the upper-tier pack comes as a bit of a shock to a program that has been in isolation for so long.

“I think the further away you get from it, the more you realize it’s a fantasy land that we made,” Auriemma said. “I recently spoke with one of my players and said, ‘If you had to do it all over again, what would you change about last year’s national championship game? You don’t have to answer , but what would you change if you were in that game again? Because I think that And there is no guarantee that you will. So you should make the most of every opportunity that comes your way. So I am really grateful for the opportunity that we have now. What made you go to Final Fours 14 times in a row? What’s the next streak, two? So it’s very hard to get there. How hard is it to win? ”

Winning a national championship is the hardest and most rewarding thing to achieve in this sport. What UConn used to do regularly, and what UConn is trying to do again, is not trivial.

UConn has reached the Final Four every season since 2008. The next longest streak is by South Carolina and Stanford. However, each season since 2016 has ended without achieving the ultimate goal. It’s been his six years of buzzer beat loss, COVID-19 crisis and injury after injury. A place that was once so stable is wild.

“It’s a reminder of how difficult this is for discerning fans,” Auriema said. “For die-hard fans, it’s ‘Rock the Door at Wealth.’ No practice. They’ll never win again. The program isn’t what it used to be. Everyone sucks. I mean, Yeah for 95% of the down-to-earth fans they are starting to realize how hard this is and how great it is to have been able to do it for all these years. will return to

This was supposed to be the era of Paige and Aji, Aji and Paige. Of a possible 72 games last season, UConn has just 42 of those players (17 for Buckers and 25 for Fudd), and Buckers hasn’t been healthy for a good chunk of her appearances. These players shared the court just 15 times last season and won’t share it again until 2023-24. Another example of a failed plan.

UConn lost arguably the best guard in the country to Bueckers.

Still, UConn is Have The best security guard in the country at Fudd.

It’s a healthier perspective. Fudd has the ability to be the best player on the court in any game the Huskies play. In some ways, Fudd will be constrained by Bookers’ absence. She also has more chances to truly execute attacks.

“I wish Paige would play because I can hit more shots,” Auriemma said. “People think that Paige is not playing so more shots are available. As soon as Paige dribbles the ball, two guys run towards her and she always Find a guy who’s open.So one side.I think she wanted Paige to play.

“On the other hand, she has more responsibilities. She has more to do. So her game will expand. One is exciting and disappointing: Paige isn’t here and the other is daunting: “Hey Aji, last year it was Paige and Aji. Isn’t that really cool?” 10 games for what, 12 games? . And she said, “It’s not something I can’t handle.”

For a team built like UConn, which ranked sixth in the Associated Press preseason poll, a situation like Bookers’ injury needn’t derail the season. canInjuries to Svetlana Avrosimova and Shea Ralph probably kept the Huskies out of the 2001 National Championship. In 1998 he ended the season’s Elite Eight with an injury to Nykesha Sales.

After that, the dynasty reached its heyday, but the years went by with few problems.

Now Husky Heads to Pursuit of 15^th Final four streak, 12 times^th A national championship with all sorts of complications. His three players – Nelson Ododa, Williams and Evina Westbrook – who led the team to his championship game at the National last season, are no longer with the team. Major Post His player Dorka Juhas has had surgery to heal a broken wrist he sustained in his NCAA Tournament last season. Aaliyah Her Edwards, arguably the team’s best post player, recently received an elbow from her mule at Nika during practice and broke her nose. And Buckers, the elite he-eight in his two overtime wins over North Carolina State and the player who propelled the team to his Fours in the Finals last season, is just an additional coach/cheerleader.

Are you sure your team is a national championship contender?

“That’s another thing we haven’t thrown out there because what’s the point?” Auriema said. “Anyway, it’s something that’s always been in the back of their minds. It was like that last year when Paige was going through 20 games he didn’t play. Championship contenders, when the day comes, we’re gone.Today, October 14th, we have a better chance of winning the national championship than anyone else.Where that takes us We don’t have as many opportunities as we did in June, but we still have a chance.”

mike.anthony@hearstmediaact.com;