Auriemma reflects on early days at UConn after 1,098th win
STORRS — Geno Auriemma was a bit nostalgic heading to Gampel Pavilion Saturday morning, where he’d collect the 1,098th victory of his Hall of Fame career.
He thought about his early days as a coach — before the national championships, before the records, before the dynasty. Those days when UConn was just another school on the map, not the behemoth it has become, and the goals weren’t as complex.
“I said if we can beat Providence, hell man, we’re going to be really, really good. If we can beat Providence and Villanova, we’ve got it made,” remembers Auriemma, who started at UConn in 1985. “Once we get there, we know we’re good. …
“They were the two best teams in the Big East. If we could beat them, man, this is like dying and going to heaven.”
UConn’s first Big East title came against Providence in 1989 (ironically a game Auriemma was not on the bench for because of a suspension).
All Auriemma’s done since then is win 1,031 more games, 11 NCAA titles, reach 20 Final Fours … and the list goes on. His latest victory — 87-50 against Providence on Satur
day at Gampel Pavilion — tied him with Tennessee legend Pat Summitt for second on the all-time list. He’s seven back of Stanford’s Tara VanDerveer.
Auriemma can pass Summitt on Wednesday when third-ranked UConn (7-0) hosts Seton Hall.
“I would like to think that if you’ve done something for 37 years that you’re going to have some milestones,” Auriemma said. “If you’re fortunate enough to have some pretty important milestones, and if you are lucky enough to be surrounded by the people that I’ve been surrounded with, there are actual meaningful milestones.”
No one has been as consistent, as dominant, and as productive as Auriemma, whose .885 winning percentage (1,098-142) is No. 1 all-time. Incredibly, he’s now gone 1,000 games without back-to-back losses.
“There’s this mindset at Connecticut where when we lose a game, everybody takes it personally,” Auriemma said. “There’s no, ‘Well, it’s just one of those things, we’ll get the next one. Don’t worry about it.’ No.
“For all those years going back, however long you want to go back, losing, whether we lost four games or five games or one game, losing a game at Connecti
cut was life-changing for a lot of those kids.”
No year, of course, is more woven into the fabric of Auriemma’s program than 1995.
A 77-66 victory over Tennessee on Martin Luther King Day in 1995 moved the Huskies to No. 1 in the polls for the first time. Auriemma called it the “single moment in Connecticut basketball history that probably pushed the snowball down
the hill for the very first time.”
Later that year, they beat the Lady Vols again, 70-64 in Minneapolis, for their first national title.
“Yeah, ’95 was a magical year,” Auriemma said. “It really was. I know it was only 25 years ago, 26 years ago. That seems like a lifetime ago.”