Bueckers playing big beyond her years to lead Uconn
SAN ANTONIO — Oneisafreshman who stepped into the job of leading the most successful program in women’s basketball. The other is a senior who accepted the call to build one of the worst into one of this season’s best.
Together, Uconn’s Paige Bueckers and Arizona’s Aari Mcdonald are two of the most dynamic scorers in the country heading into their Friday night clash in the women’s NCAA Tournament Final Four.
Uconn won the River Walk region and rides into its 13th consecutive Final Four as Bueckers this week became the first freshman to win
The Associated Press national player of the year award.
Bueckers led the Huskies (28-1) in scoring, assists and steals this season and scored 28 points in their 69-67 regional final win over Baylor. Auriemma this week called Bueckers “dominant” in “the biggest games we played.”
Mcdonald’s burden was to build a winner at a program stuck in a basketball desert. Coach Adia Barnes put that job on her as soon as McDonald transferred from Washington in 2017 when the Wildcats were living at the bottom of the Pac-12.
Mcdonald sat out the 2017-18 season and watched as Arizona won six games. Now she is the conference player of the year and has the Wildcats on level ground with the Huskies for at least one more day.
“It’s crazy. We really started at the bottom,” Mcdonald said. “Coach (Adia) Barnes and the other coaches. They do a great job recruiting. They changed the culture since I’ve been here. My teammates have put in so much work and it’s exciting to see it all pay off.”
The Wildcats (20-5) won the Mercado region as a No. 3 seed. McDonald has scored at least 31 points in each of the Wildcats’ previous two games. Against Indiana in the regional final, she twisted her left ankle with 2:35 left, but limped back on to put the exclamation on the win with a 3-point play. She said the ankle should be fine Friday night.
“Nobody thinks we can win. We’re the underdogs We’re going to play loose and free” Mcdonald said.
Chip on her shoulder
Dawn Staley remembers talking to her Olympic coach Tara Vanderveer before she took the job at Temple two decades ago.
The longtime Stanford coach actually suggested that Staley not become the head coach at the Philadelphia school because she was still playing in the WNBA and wouldn’t have the time to do both well.
Twenty-one years later and Staley admits she still has a bit of a chip on her shoulder about that conversation and has used it as motivation both at Temple and now South Carolina.
“I don’t look down on her because she put that chip on my shoulder,” Staley said. “I just needed that, the past 21 years. I thank her for making the chip a little bit bigger.”
The two friends meet Friday night in the Final Four when Vanderveer and Stanford takes on Staley’s Gamecocks.
Vanderveer said she has the utmost respect for her former Olympic point guard.
“As a player, she saw the game so well she really has great instincts, a great understanding of the game,” Vanderveer said Thursday. “She’s a great leader of her team.”
Vanderveer knew when she was coaching Staley in the 1996 Atlanta Games that she would be successful in whatever occupation she chose.
Staley is “someone who is super competitive, whatever Dawn decided to go into she was going to be at the top of whatever career she decided,” Vanderveer said. “In law, politics, she has it, she’s a very special person. I cheer for her every game except for the game tomorrow.”
This isn’t the first meeting between the two on the big stage. They played in the 2017 Final Four and South Carolina rallied from a ninepoint halftime deficit to win en route to the NCAA championship.