Shocking news: A star player for the Uconn women’s basketball is banned while sending a powerful statment to the team
STORRS, Connecticut As the head coach of the University of Connecticut women’s basketball team, Geno Auriemma has won 11 national titles, and he thinks he has what it takes to win a twelve.
In jest, he compares his two 5-foot-11 guards, Paige Bueckers and Azzi Fudd, who are among the best in the league, to the Huskies’ Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris.
After leading UConn to the Final Four in Minneapolis the previous season, Bueckers and Fudd have not played together since the Huskies’ April championship game loss to South Carolina due to knee problems.
“You mean we only have two players from each generation?” During practice on Friday, Auriemma, 68, made a snarky statement while sitting in the first row of the Gampel Pavilion stands. “You know how Paige and Azzi are coming here together, Mantle and Maris?”
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Sitting beneath his championship banners, Auriemma assessed his team and saw that they resembled a hospital ward rather than a basketball team.
Fudd, a sophomore from Arlington, Virginia, limped onto the floor on crutches wearing a black brace on her right knee. Curry is one of Fudd’s admirers; the two signed with his company, SC30 Inc., in November. Fudd, who leads UConn in scoring with 17.9 points per game, suffered a knee injury in a Dec. 4 loss to Notre Dame and missed eight games as a result.
On January 11, she made a comeback against St. John’s, scoring 14 points. However, she re-injured her knee four days later in a victory over Georgetown. Auriemma stated that she will be reevaluated in two weeks. She will miss a number of games, including one on Thursday against Tennessee, a longtime rival, and one on February 5 against South Carolina, a rematch of the 2022 national championship game.
During Friday’s practice, Hopkins, Minnesota native Bueckers tossed the ball to her teammates while sporting a sleeve on her left knee. She was the 2021 national player of the year, but she is out for the season after tearing her anterior cruciate ligament during a pickup game in August.
Over the previous two seasons, the two have played in 15 of a possible 55 games together. Only a few of the 15 games last year had Bueckers playing at full strength, according to Auriemma.
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