TAMPA, Florida — Azzi Fudd has been through the ringer.
A torn ACL and MCL in high school. A foot injury as a UConn freshman. A knee injury as a sophomore. A season-ending ACL tear as a junior. The former No. 1 recruit in the class of 2021 has had to overcome a lot.
But on Sunday, she relished a long overdue moment of pure jubilation. The buzzer sounded on UConn’s thorough victory over South Carolina in the national championship game, and Fudd ran straight toward her teammates, jumping in celebration with them.
Shop UConn championship gearFudd’s game-high 24 points earned her Most Outstanding Player honors, the culmination of a journey that has thrown some brutal setbacks her way.
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“I still don’t have words to describe just what this is,” Fudd said. “This is such an incredible feeling, but with this team, it means even more. And I’m just so proud because we’ve been through so much together … Just to know all of this has happened for a reason, and just to have this positive outcome, I’m speechless.”
Fudd was fully healthy against the Gamecocks on Sunday, unlike in 2022 when she came down with a stomach illness the night before the national championship game and was limited to 16 minutes in the loss.
This time around, in this rematch on the biggest stage in college basketball, Fudd was cooking all game. She hit pull-up after pull-up off the dribble and had a particularly filthy crossover to punctuate her 11-point third quarter. She was disruptive defensively, turning two first half steals into easy layups on the other end.
Her performance capped off an excellent Final Four run that also saw her put up 19 points in the Huskies’ blowout of UCLA. After the title game, head coach Geno Auriemma said he felt like Fudd was “the key to the tournament.”
This moment has been in the making for Fudd’s entire life. Her father used to Saran wrap her right arm to her body, forcing her to practice dribbling with her left. She’s even named after former UConn star Jennifer Azzi. It almost feels like destiny.
Fudd has already elected to return to UConn for the 2025-26 season, where she’ll aim to help UConn repeat as champions. But for now, the focus will be celebrating the Huskies’ first championship nearly a decade, one that she had to conquer a lot to reach.
“Azzi has done a remarkable job of overcoming trials in her life,” teammate and close friend Paige Bueckers said. “And however that looks like, injury, illness, whatever it is — we know nothing beats Azzi.”
Bo Underwood is a student in the University of Georgia’s Sports Media Certificate program.
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