A conversation with UConn coach
Auriemma adjusts to life with COVID, watching UConn from home
UConn coach Geno Auriemma, still in a virtual lockdown at home as he recovers from COVID-19, has no sense of taste or smell, he said Monday.
His hearing and vision are fine, of course, and he watched on TV as the Huskies opened the NCAA Tournament Sunday night in San Antonio with a 10259 victory over High Point.
“It was weird, complaining about the same things I would complain about if I was on the bench,” said Auriemma, who lives in Manchester. “The only difference is, they weren’t hearing me and there was nothing I could do about it.
I was howling at the moon. There was nothing going on. But it’s funny, when I read Paige [Bueckers’] comments saying, ‘That first quarter, I could feel Coach Auriemma yelling at me through the TV.’ Like, damn right I was yelling at her.”
Auriemma watched the game with Kathy, his wife of 42 years.
“At one point, we did look at each other and say this was probably the first time ever that we watched a game together on TV,” Auriemma said. “So it was another first in a year of firsts. I got up at one point and walked out, said ‘I can’t watch this.’”
Tuesday is Auriemma’s 67th birthday. The Huskies play a second-round game against Syracuse at 9 p.m. He is scheduled to take a private flight from Connecticut to San Antonio Wednesday morning, rejoining the team — if, in fact, it wins Tuesday — after a 10-day period of isolation. UConn’s next game would be either Saturday or Sunday.
Kathy, at least initially, will not travel. Auriemma said she, too, has tested positive for COVID.
“She ended up getting it from me,” said Auriemma, who tested positive March 14. “But, same thing, hardly any [symptoms] because she had had the vaccine, too.”
Auriemma still isn’t sure how he contracted the virus. He said he has not recently visited his Manchester restaurant, Café Aura, which announced last Tuesday it would temporarily shut down due to a “front of house team member” testing positive for COVID.
“No, I haven’t been there,” he said. “There’s places you wish you could go that you just don’t. You’re pretty much home all the time. Or, normal things — go to the grocery store, the drug store, go pick up something, all in a normal way of life. So, I don’t know [how I contracted the virus]. I always made sure I asked, ‘Is there an explanation for that? [Medical professionals] were like, ‘No, not really.’
“You don’t know. I try to think of when I left Mohegan [March 8] after we won the Big East championship. Nothing. I went nowhere out of the ordinary. I went to get my neck looked at because I had strained it really good, so I thought, ‘Wouldn’t that be ironic if I went to the doctor to get fixed and I got COVID at the doctor’s office?’ Who the hell knows? Maybe when I was getting my second [vaccine] shot. They sit you there for 15 minutes or whatever to observe you and guys walk by, ‘Hey, congratulations, Coach.’ But you’re sitting there with your mask on. Who knows?”
Auriemma said he’s feeling fine beyond the loss of taste and smell. He’s bored, of course, and remaining as engaged with the team as technology allows. UConn is down to two coaches — associate head coach Chris Dailey, who ran the team Sunday, and assistant Jamelle Elliott — because assistant Shea Ralph had returned to Connecticut four days earlier upon learning a member of her family had tested positive.
“You realize how many people have already been through it, or how many experiences have already been had by a lot of people in the basketball community and otherwise,” he said of friends and colleagues reaching out to him this week. “It’s just ironic that I went a whole year, 12 months, kind of trying to live a normal life. Go to the places you used to go, do the things you used to do. Obviously, you couldn’t do everything, but you wear your mask and follow the protocols, don’t go places where there are a lot of people, don’t put yourself in any precarious situations. You go a whole year, and starting in September you’re testing three times a week. And then you’re testing every day, every day, every day. Then you get your vaccine and you go, ‘Phew! I might have dodged a bullet.’ Then you get your second vaccine and you say, ‘Yeah, I’m right there at the finish line.’ And four days later, you test positive.”
UConn played well Sunday. Bueckers (9-for-12 from the field) had 24 points, nine rebounds and six assists. Nika Muhl, another starting freshman guard, left the game with 6:08 remaining in the first half with a sprained ankle. Muhl was in a lot of pain, and clearly upset, after her ankle rolled violently. She wound up on crutches. On Monday, Dailey said Muhl’s status is day-to-day.
“It’s such a fragile thing to begin with,” Auriemma said. “The whole tournament, the whole setup, you’re young, you’re already missing some coaches. Now, all of the sudden, one of your starters, a kid who really energizes the team a lot, goes down and you’re thinking and hoping that it’s just a sprained ankle, nothing more than that. But she’s a really tough kid, so the look on her face, man, you feel terrible for her. These kids, they look forward to this the whole season. This is what they gear up for. To have something like that happen, the doubts and fears and everything creep in.”
Auriemma spoke to the team after it arrived back at its San Antonio hotel Sunday night, just a couple minutes on Zoom. He was scheduled to do so again Monday afternoon.
“They were in great spirits,” he said. “They were just happy to get a game under their belt. It’s so unusual. When you go to the NCAA Tournament, you don’t [ordinarily] get on a plane and go someplace and wait five or six days before you play your first game. So it was a lot of down time.”
During the game, Auriemma was more connected to a former player than any current players. Renee Montgomery was the color analyst for the ESPN telecast.
“Renee was right on,” Auriemma said. “She mentioned a lot of really insightful things, what happens during a game or what happens at this particular time of year, what the thought process is for a kid at this stage, what it’s like to be at Connecticut and have to perform in the NCAA Tournament, how it’s not like any other place.”
Auriemma’s pre-game meal couldn’t have been very enjoyable.
“Somebody told me you can eat whatever you want, it all tastes the same,” he said. “I wonder if I close my eyes and you put three or four things in front of me, whether I’d be able to tell the difference. Because you look at things and you say, ‘Oh, yeah, that’s what this is supposed to taste like.’ You trick yourself. It’s a weird sensation, for sure.”
So it doesn’t matter what flavor Tuesday’s cake will be — if there is one. Auriemma has only one birthday plan. To watch TV again, and hope UConn wins again, so he can join the team Wednesday.
“Just try to sit here and get good vibes going down in that direction,” he said. “It’s quite a different matchup than what they had [Sunday], in Syracuse’s size and length. I’ll be nervous. I’ll be anxious. I’ll be pacing. I’ll be happy. I’ll be complaining. I’ll be ecstatic with some plays, and furious, having every emotion you can imagine.” He laughed.
“And then they’ll have the first timeout.”