UConn women’s basketball team is flying high in the Big East Conference to the point that their coach Geno Auriemma thinks they may have already reached their peak.
The coach of UConn women’s college basketball team does not think his team will get much better as they head towards the playoffs.
Geno Auriemma’s team is at the top of the Big East with a conference record of 18 wins and no losses. The 69-year-old has coached the Connecticut-based team since 1985 and knows exactly what it takes to guide a squad to a championship win.
Having won 11 championships during his time as Huskies coach, he knows that by the time March comes around, there is little time to make significant changes before the postseason begins.
That being said, given his team’s undefeated record this season, he does expect them to perform much better than what they have already shown.
“At this time of the year, I’ve always said, it’s not that easy. Not that easy to get that much better,” the head coach said. “By this point in the year you’re pretty much, ‘This is who you are’. When we’re good, we’re really really good. And we hope that we can be really, really good three more days.”
UConn’s unbeaten run is all the more impressive given the length of their injury list. Azzi Fudd, Caroline Ducharme, Jana El Alfy, Aubrey Griffin are all injured as well as Ayanna Patterson, who is out for the rest of the season.
Junior forward Amari DeBerry is also out, meaning Uconn had just eight players available for their final regular season game against Providence, which they still won 65-42.
This ensured the Huskies clinched their first undefeated conference season in three years. Paige Bueckers and Aaliyah Edwards combined to score 30 of their team’s 65 points at Alumni Hall.
With the playoffs on the horizon and three games scheduled in as many days, coach Auriemma then decided to rest his star duo for majority of the second behalf and the entire fourth quarter.
With a depleted roster, Auriemma is realistic heading into the playoffs which commence on Saturday in the Big East Tournament quarterfinals. “The future with us this year has been so unpredictable in that we have no idea who’s going to still be able to play 40 minutes, 35 minutes,” he said.
“So, we’re going to take it one game at a time. But we potentially have two games left in our season, right? If we lose the first round of the Big East Tournament, we’re done. If we lose a game in the NCAA Tournament, we’re done. So, we either have two left or you could have nine left. You’re asking me how far can we go?
“Some years, I would tell you I like our chances. Some years, I would tell you we have to get really lucky. I would say this year, we would have to get exceptionally lucky to go really deep in this tournament.”