SI:AM | UConn’s Dynasty Lives On

Good morning, I’m Dan Gartland. I’m so glad I finished doing the dishes in time to catch UConn’s buzzer beater.

In today’s SI:AM:
🤯 A March Madness classic
😅 A comeback on the women’s side
🏀 Men’s Final Four preview

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Connecticut owns March

It was a great weekend to be a basketball fan in Connecticut. Scratch that. It’s been a great few decades to be a basketball fan in Connecticut.

The UConn men’s and women’s programs are both headed to the Final Four after prevailing in their respective regionals this weekend. It’s the sixth time that the Huskies have sent both teams to the Final Four in the same year, and UConn is the only school to have done so more than once. It’s the eighth Final Four appearance for the men’s program and an unbelievable 25th for the women.

It’s hardly a surprise that the UConn women are back in the Final Four. They stretched their undefeated record to 38–0 with comfortable wins over North Carolina and Notre Dame in the Sweet 16 and Elite Eight, and are still heavily favored to cut down the nets in Phoenix. The men, on the other hand, needed to complete a stunning comeback against top-seeded Duke to punch their ticket to Indianapolis.

UConn trailed by 19 points in the first half of Sunday’s Elite Eight game against Duke and was down by 15 at halftime. The Huskies narrowed the gap in the second half before freshman Braylon Mullins drilled an instantly iconic 35-foot game-winner with less than a second on the clock.

It was the second-biggest deficit overcome in an Elite Eight game—trailing only Louisville’s 20-point comeback against West Virginia in 2005—and the largest halftime lead blown by a No. 1 seed.

“That’s an epic, just another chapter in the UConn-Duke NCAA tournament dramatics,” UConn coach Dan Hurley said. “We’ve had to show a lot of fortitude and resilience and just kind of claw our way through the season. Thought the game was a microcosm of that. We fought, we clawed, put ourselves in position to take advantage of a mistake that they made.

“And one of the most brilliant shooters you’ll ever see shoot a basketball made an incredible, legendary March shot.”

Mullins is a good shooter, but he hasn’t been lately. The 6'6" freshman from Greenfield, Ind. had shot 4-for-23 from three in the NCAA tournament before his heroic last-second attempt. No one will remember his 0-for-8 performance against Furman in the first round now that he’s hit one of the most memorable shots in March Madness history.

Mullins’s shot revived the UConn men’s dynasty under Hurley. After winning back-to-back national championships in 2023 and ’24, the Huskies fell flat last season in their attempt for a three-peat. They entered the NCAA tournament at 23–10, good enough to earn a No. 8 seed, and lost in the second round to eventual champion Florida. While they had a much better year this season (29–5 entering tournament play), they didn’t seem like a real championship contender. Losses late in the regular season to Creighton and Marquette, both of whom finished below .500, and a blowout loss to St. John’s in the Big East championship game cast doubt on the Huskies’ ability to get out of a stacked East regional. But they did, and now they’re two wins away from a third championship in four years.

The best of Sports Illustrated

Lauren Betts with the ball in the post — Lauren Betts and UCLA are headed to the Final Four after a comeback win over Duke. | Ed Szczepanski-Imagn Images

Bryan Fischer details how the UConn men’s basketball team performed a late miracle in rallying from a 19-point deficit to knock out Duke and secure a spot in the Final Four.
Dusty May has the Michigan men’s basketball team back in the Final Four after a dominant win over Tennessee and has transformed the program faster than anyone expected, writes Kevin Sweeney.
Lauren Betts has learned to trust herself, and Emma Baccellieri reports there was no better display of that than her performance UCLA's comeback win against Duke in the Elite Eight as the Bruins earned a second straight trip to the women’s Final Four.
Pat Forde previews the men’s Final Four and dubs one matchup the de facto national championship game.
Michael Rosenberg says Notre Dame had the right game plan for UConn during the Elite Eight, but executing it was always going to be the challenging part against the defending national champions.
Elana Meyers Taylor, the most decorated Black Winter Olympian of all time, reveals to Brigid Kennedy that she has politics in mind for her next act.

The top five…

… reactions to UConn’s buzzer beater:
5. The radio calls from the UConn, Duke and national broadcasts.
4. Matt Norlander, Hakem Dermish, Gary Parrish and Avery Johnson in the CBS Sports HQ studio.
3. Grant Hill and Bill Raftery’s stunned silence.
2. Dan Hurley’s headbutt with a ref.
1. Hurley’s parents cursing in perfect sync.