The Register Citizen (Torrington, CT)
Huskies face Oregon tonight in Elite Eight
Win over Oregon would send UConn to 10th straight Final Four
BRIDGEPORT >> A fresh-faced Oregon team could be the darling of the women’s basketball world with a dynamic freshman class and walking sound bite of a head coach who is no stranger to March Madness success.
There’s one little problem to have this feel-good story to continue. Actually, it is not such a little problem but a rather mammoth one.
Four-time defending national champion UConn, playing in its home state, is a heavy favorite to extend its NCAA Division I women’s basketball record for consecutive Final Fours to 10 in Monday’s regional final (7 p.m., ESPN).
Yes, Geno Auriemma knows that there are going to the roars of approval on that night when the Huskies’ dominant run eventually comes to an end.
UConn’s Hall of Fame coach, who can become the women’s Division I leader in NCAA tournament victories if the Huskies end Oregon’s Cinderella run, realizes that more than a few who tune into the game would relish in UConn’s agony if the Huskies’ do the unthinkable and get eliminated in the Elite Eight.
However, Auriemma is going to do everything in his power to make certain that the heavily-favored Huskies’ quest for an unprecedented fifth straight women’s Division I national title will extend into this weekend’s Final Four in Dallas.
“We are not ready to walk away yet,” Auriemma said.
There have been reports of the Huskies being a 24-point favorite against the 10th-seeded Ducks, a team featuring three freshmen starters.
Auriemma did not see footage of the enthusiastic response Oregon coach Kelly Graves received from
his players when he entered the locker room after upsetting Maryland in the Sweet 16 at Webster Bank Arena. Graves was beaming from ear to ear as his players doused him with water.
“In 1991 I didn’t want to leave the locker room because I was crying (when UConn secured its first Final Four berth),” Auriemma said. “Literally tears were coming out of my eyes and I couldn’t go out of the locker room yet and we were in Philadelphia at the time. Now we win the other night (and I’m upset) because I can’t get our guys to put their hands up on defense or make a back cut to get open and we were miserable the last five minutes of the game. Yeah, I wish I was getting a water shower after a game, but I don’t think that will happen anytime soon.”
What figures to happen is for Auriemma to push his four-time defending national champions to start and finish the game better than the Huskies did in Saturday’s win over UCLA.
There are so many streaks associated with Auriemma’s current team. There is the NCAA all-divisional basketball record 110-game winning streak, the run of 27 straight wins in the NCAA tournament and also the 134 wins in a row against unranked opponents and just one loss to an unranked foe in the last 310 games.
“When you start with the right players that want to be on a great team or they wouldn’t come here,” Auriemma said. “They want to be really good because they sense that if they come to Connecticut, they have a chance to be something really special if they work at it. So once they decide to make that commitment and they’re willing to give up a little bit of their ego for it, then you can appeal to them about what it takes to get better and how much you have to improve every minute of every day. You have to prove every game that you’re as good as you think you are.
“Going out, going through the motions and losing to somebody that has no business beating you, that makes you like everybody else, so why did you come here? I find myself saying that. I must say that every day. If you want to be like everybody else, why did you come here? So we’re trying to be different. We’re trying to do things that are hard to do, that are not the norm.”
Oregon has also accomplished something that isn’t seen every day by becoming the third double-digit seed to advance to the Elite Eight in the NCA A women’s Division I tournament. Lamar accomplished the feat in 1991 and so did Gonzaga, also coached by Graves, in 2011. Those teams lost the regional finals by 15 and 23 points respectively.
“It’s in front of us now, so it’s obviously something we’re thinking about,” Graves said.
Graves has six freshmen on his third Oregon team including starters Ruthy Hebard, Sabrina Ionescu and Mallory McGwire. Graves has joked that his team is too young to realize that they aren’t supposed to have beaten the No. 2, 3 and 7 seeds. The reality is that this is a team playing much older than they actually are.
“We’re excited for this opportunity, especially as a young group,” Ionescu said. “I think it’s going to test us in many ways and I think we’re just excited to see where we stand and get a shot at playing against the No. 1 team in the country.”