Current UConnND rivalry more of a mirage

STORRS — Caught short by college basketball circumstance, too many young players and not enough experience talent, Muffet McGraw didn’t have a chance at Gampel Pavilion on this Sunday. Not a chance.

This wasn’t the worst beating the UConn women had ever given Notre Dame, but that’s only because the Huskies didn’t press the issue. They went up 34 points with 6:09 left in the third quarter and, from there, it was whatever final score UConn wanted.

UConn decided it would be 8157. So it was.

After they were stunned by the Fighting Irish in the 2001 Final Four, the Huskies returned to crush the Irish, 8053, at the XL Center on Jan. 21, 2002. There also were 26 and a 25point routs along the way. None felt like this one.

Sellout crowd? Check. Muffet McGraw on the bench? Check.

Players in Notre Dame uniforms? Check.

National television? Check. Still, it felt like Notre Dame of South Bend sent Notre Dame High of West Haven to play UConn.

The best rivalry in college women’s basketball wasn’t Sunday. It was a mirage. Megan Walker took what she wanted. She wanted 26 points and 13 rebounds. Olivia NelsonOdoda took what she wanted and that was 16 points, 10 rebounds and three blocks.

“The biggest problem was we really overscheduled,” McGraw said. “This team wasn’t ready for our schedule.”

McGraw’s answers were short. She was glum and that’s understandable. After winning the 2018 national championship and coming within seconds of repeating in 2019, after dramatically eliminating the Huskies in the Final Four both years, the Irish are rebuilding.

To be fair, the term rebuilding doesn’t capture how far the Irish have dropped in eight months. They are 56. They lost to Florida Gulf Coast. They lost to South Dakota State. They lost to Tennessee, Michigan State and Minnesota. One of the great powerhouses of women’s basketball is under .500 for the first time since Dec. 7, 2003, when they were 34.

“I thought it was 1992,” McGraw said.

That’s the last time they were under .500 after 10 games.

McGraw talked about this game being a great learning experience, especially for the freshmen. She talked about continuing to battle and working on the little things they can control. She sounded like the coach of East Carolina or Tulane or one of a hundred coaches who come into Storrs with a smile and leave with a laundry list of what they were going to work on when the return home.

“I think we can get better, I think we can get a lot better,” McGraw said. “Going into the season we knew we weren’t going to be able to score. So we worked a lot on our defense. We haven’t been able to play great defense. We’re limited a little by our numbers, so we’re playing a lot of zone.”

Yeah, Muffet did a Final Four jig after beating UConn.

No, Muffet wasn’t dancing Sunday.

Arike Ogunbowale? Gone. Brianna Turner? Gone. Jessica Shepard? Gone. Marina Mabrey? Gone. All graduated and off to the WNBA. And that’s only part of it.

Jackie Young decided to leave after her junior year and became the No. 1 pick in the WNBA Draft. So that wiped out the entire starting five from the team that broke UConn’s heart. Twice. On this day, the Huskies wanted to speed the game up against Notre Dame. Usually, you’re trying to stop Notre Dame from scoring 100.

Jordan Nixon and Danielle Patterson transferred after last season. Two returning players, Abby Prohaska and Mikayla Vaughn, are out indefinitely with health issues. The Irish entered Sunday without 98 percent of their points from last season. There is significant talent, but it’s young.

Deeper than that, Erin Boley and Ali Patberg transferred to Oregon and Indiana a couple of years ago. Put those two with Jackie Young and the Irish sure as heck wouldn’t have dropped out of the Top 25 for the first time in 12 years, a 234week run. And now, as she sat there, McGraw was wondering how bad an injury highly recruited freshman Sam Brunelle sustained during the game.

Think about this.

The last time UConn wasn’t ranked in the Top 25 was the final poll of the 199293 season. You remember 1993. Jurassic Park. Whoomp! (There It Is) by Tag Team. Beverly Hills: 90210.

The last time UConn wasn’t ranked in the top five was 2007.

“There have been times when we’ve had 15 players on the roster and I’m thinking who needs 15 players? Nobody,” Geno Auriemma said. “Except those years when two guys transfer, two guys get hurt and you don’t have enough good players. Sometimes things happen to your program that you have no control over.

“How do you prevent it? I don’t know. We have always tried to have a philosophy of two AllAmericans in every single class. I don’t mean high AllAmericans.”

He means current ones or one that will develop into them.

“If you can do that, you can have a better chance of withstanding some of things that you can’t control,” Auriemma said. “When we lost Stewie and that whole crew, did we know Pheesa and Lou as sophomores would like dominate the country and be firstteam AllAmericans coming out of nowhere after playing spare roles? No, we didn’t know that. We certainly knew they had the potential. It just happened really fast.

“We had no returning AllAmericans this year. It could just as easily be we lose to Ohio State. We lose at Seton Hall. But Megan is playing like she is a firstteam AllAmerican player. I don’t know anybody that’s playing better than her in the country. Crystal Dangerfield isn’t even 100 percent yet. Our freshmen are spotty. We’re getting exactly what we need because we have those people in the program.”

Auriemma taps the table for good luck.

“It’s not hard to get caught in Notre Dame’s situation,” Auriemma said. “It’s not. It can happen. It happens to a lot of people.”

There were no sharp comments delivered by either coach this time. Why? This rout seemed dispiriting. And it almost sounded like Auriemma felt a little sorry for McGraw and Notre Dame.

Nah.

This is greatest rivalry in women’s basketball. Notre Dame will be back in the future.

In the meantime, thank the rivalry gods that Tennessee is back on the schedule.