UConn a 2 seed for 1st time since ’06

HARTFORD, Conn. — The Connecticut women’s basketball team will be a No. 2 seed in the NCAA Tournament, a surprising twist after the Huskies were ranked second in the Associated Press poll the final eight weeks of the season. It is the first time UConn has not been a No. 1 seed in the tournament since 2006.

“We felt that it came down to strength of schedule, strength of conference, as well as how they were playing down the stretch,” Ronda Lundin Bennett, chair of the NCAA Division I Women’s Basketball Selection Committee said in an interview with ESPN. She added that the committee members agreed other teams were playing better than the Huskies coming down the stretch of the season.

The seed doesn’t mean much to Coach Geno Auriemma, he said Monday.

Auriemma sarcastically added that with two losses this season, he expected to be a No. 4 or No. 5 seed. UConn’s membership in the American Athletic Conference would not have mattered if the team went undefeated, Auriemma said.

“Not if we had gone undefeated, would it? So if we had won those two games we lost we would be a No. 1 seed, right?” Auriemma said. “So yeah, we have to go undefeated every year, basically, is what they’re saying.”

UConn (31-2) lost to Louisville and Baylor, but finished the season as regular-season AAC champions and won the conference tournament.

The bracket puts the Huskies in the same regional as Louisville, which gave UConn one of its two losses this season, along with Maryland, Tennessee and Oregon State, among others.

UConn’s first two rounds of the tournament will be played in Gampel Pavilion, with the Huskies taking on Towson at 5:30 p.m. Central Friday. If UConn wins, it would face the winner of Buffalo-Rutgers on Sunday.

The past two seasons UConn has lost in the Final Four, claiming its last national title in 2016.

The Huskies won a total of 11, all under Auriemma, and made 19 Final Four appearances. Overall, the Huskies are 118-19 in the NCAA Tournament.

UALR (21-10)