TAMPA, Fla. – Geno Auriemma raised his fists in the air, pumping them as the buzzer sounded.
His UConn women’s basketball staff rose to their feet behind him to welcome the five Huskies on the floor back to the bench, and the crowd at Amalie Arena burst into a roar.
It was only the end of the third quarter of the national championship game against South Carolina, but Auriemma knew. Everyone in the arena already knew. UConn was only 10 minutes away from winning its 12th national championship.
The No. 2 seed Huskies carried a 20-point lead into the fourth quarter and extended it to beat South Carolina 82-59 Sunday and win their first national championship in nine years. The Gamecocks never got within 20 points the rest of the game as UConn outscored them 46-33 after halftime.
UConn returned to the mountain top, and it took down two No. 1 seeds in Tampa to do it. The Huskies were dominant in the Final Four, blowing out No. 1 overall seed UCLA 85-51 on Friday before dismantling the No. 1 seed Gamecocks (35-4) on Sunday. The first time UConn met South Carolina in the 2022 national championship game, it lost.
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Not this time. Senior guard Azzi Fudd was magnificent for UConn (37-3), scoring a game-high 24 points on 9-for-17 shooting with five rebounds and three steals. She fueled an 8-0 run in the second quarter that put the Huskies up 33-22, and it was the moment the Huskies firmly took hold of the game. Fudd scored six points on the run, and she capped it with a steal off South Carolina star MiLaysia Fulwiley near half court that led to an easy layup.
But it wasn’t just Fudd. UConn got everything it needed from its three stars to put on the kind of performance that was reminiscent of the dominant Huskies teams at the beginning of this storied dynasty.
Freshman forward Sarah Strong didn’t blink in the first national championship game of her career. Strong was a brick wall in the paint, and she played a significant role in holding the Gamecocks to only 26 paint points.
Strong finished with 24 points on 10-for-15 shooting, adding 15 rebounds, a team-high five assists, three blocks and two steals. Senior guard Paige Bueckers added 17 points on 5-for-14 shooting with six rebounds, three assists, two blocks and a steal.
The Huskies took hold of the game early, not allowing South Carolina to get into a rhythm offensively. The Gamecocks went on two long scoring droughts that combined for 10 scoreless minutes in the first half. Tessa Johnson and Joyce Edwards led South Carolina with 10 points each.
