Editor's Note: Dick Weiss, a member of the U.S. Basketball Writers Association Hall of Fame, has covered college sports in Philadelphia and New York for more than 40 years. He will be providing regular commentary for the American Athletic Conference during the 2014-15 season.
UConn’s emphatic win against South Carolina Monday showed that the Huskies are once again the team to beat.
by Dick Weiss
The University of Connecticut's women are the face of the American Athletic Conference and the best team in college basketball, regardless of gender.
We're not about to speculate how they would do against an elite men's team because the two sports are so different.
But the Huskies have the most dominant combination of offensive efficiency, speed and defense in the country. And their Hall of Fame and Olympic coach Geno Auriemma is arguably one of the top five coaches in any team sport.
Don't bet against Geno in a big game in the late regular season or during March Madness.
The second-ranked Huskies (23-1) put on another clinic in Storrs Monday night, giving Dawn Staley's top-ranked, previously undefeated SEC colossus South Carolina a dose of reality, 85-62, before a sellout crowd of more than 10,000 who braved treacherous blizzard conditions that dropped a foot of snow in New England to watch their beloved team shred one of the best defenses in the country at Gampel Pavilion.
Auriemma has won 902 career games in 30 years. He has won nine national championships, taking his teams to 13 Final Fours and is an astounding 17-3 in games pitting the No. 1 vs. 2 teams in the AP poll. And there is seemingly no end in sight. The 60-year old Auriemma signed a $10.86 million contract in 2013, a deal designed to keep him at the school through the 2017-18 season.
His teams have become a must see attraction on this campus.
Students arrived more than two hours before the game started to get in their seats where they picked up t-shirts with the phrase “Basketball Capital of the World.” Even the 600 fans who couldn't make it turned in their tickets so that students on campus could attend to make this game a sellout. This was the first on-campus sellout for UConn since last season's senior day.
“I can't say enough about all the fans who braved the elements to come out here. That's pretty special,” Auriemma said.
It's not often that UConn has hosted a No. 1 team in the nation. Usually, it's the Huskies who are on top.
South Carolina has been No. 1 in the poll the last 12 weeks since UConn suffered its only loss of the season, in overtime at Stanford.
The Gamecocks are 22-1 today and there is definitely a gap between these two teams.
No one was beating this Huskies team on this night in this gym in an ESPN Big Monday game that was the best possible advertisement for how far the women's game has come since Auriemma began his Wooden-like dynasty.
Kaleena Mosqueda-Lewis, arguably the best pure shooter in the country, scored 23 points and drained five more 3-pointers. Junior All American forward Breanna Stewart, the 6-4 two-time Most Outstanding Player in the NCAA women's tournament, piled up 22 points, eight rebounds and five blocked shots, dominating South Carolina's bigs at both ends of the floor. The Huskies also got 17 points from Morgan Tuck and 16 points, six assists and two steals from guard Morriah Jefferson, whose speed in the open floor was a huge difference-maker with her ability to get to the rim at will.
“You don't go into any game thinking four of your starters will be on their ‘A’ game,” Auriemma said. “If you get two in a game like this, it’s a lot. We got four.”
Stewart reasserted herself as the most complete player in the country, just two days after Auriemma benched her, Tuck and Kiah Stokes for most of the Huskies' game at Memphis because he said he was not pleased with their approach. “This isn't some subliminal message I'm sending to them where I expect them to read between the lines,” Auriemma said after that game. “This is very flat out.”
Message received.
Stewart responded well as she was 7-of-14 from the floor and 8-of-11 from the free-throw line, never leaving the floor until the end. Tuck also had a strong game with 17 points, six rebounds and three assists in 19 minutes.
Auriemma is a master motivator who realized the historic significance of this nonleague showdown. This was Tennessee 20 years later. South Carolina's 22nd straight wins to start the season matched the best start of any team in school history, tying the 2000 baseball team and the 1979-80 tennis team. The Gamecocks hadn't given up more than 63 points in any game this season prior to this one. They had held 11 opponents to less than 50.
But they had no answers for the Huskies, who took control late in the first half with a 32-13 run to take a 47-31 lead and never looked back.
“It didn't play out exactly as I had hoped,” Auriemma admitted. “I didn't think we'd be able to keep them off the backboard and we didn't. They had 21 offensive rebounds. But at the same time, we seemed to get every loose ball and we made a bunch of shots [31-for-56] again. But it played out at the pace I wanted. I didn't want this to be a halfcourt game played at 65-60. I was adamant that it wasn't what I wanted.”
Aleighsa Welch and SEC Player of the Year Tiffany Mitchell each scored 17 to lead the Gamecocks.
“I think this was one night, one game in February,” Auriemma said. “They are going to be playing deep into the NCAA tournament. I told Dawn that I hope we play them in Tampa. That would be pretty special.”
By Tuesday, UConn had reclaimed the top spot in the USA Today Coaches’ Poll. If the Huskies, who have never lost a conference game as an American Athletic Conference member, beat Tulane Saturday, they would reclaim the No. 1 position in the Associated Press poll. With about a minute left Monday, the student section at Gampel started chanting, “We're No. 1.”
There was little debate about that.