Women's Fastbreak On SI

Geno Auriemma Notes Lack of UConn Championship of Bust Mentality After Big East Win

NCAA National Championships aren't everything for the UConn Huskies according to their head coach.
Grant Young|
Feb 12, 2025; Storrs, Connecticut, USA; UConn Huskies head coach Geno Auriemma watches from the sideline as they take on the St. John's Red Storm at Harry A. Gampel Pavilion. Mandatory Credit: David Butler II-Imagn Images
Feb 12, 2025; Storrs, Connecticut, USA; UConn Huskies head coach Geno Auriemma watches from the sideline as they take on the St. John's Red Storm at Harry A. Gampel Pavilion. Mandatory Credit: David Butler II-Imagn Images | David Butler II-Imagn Images

The UConn Huskies women's basketball team secured their fifth straight Big East regular season championship with their 72-53 win over No. 22 ranked Creighton on February 27.

While it might sound surprising that the Huskies haven't won more consecutive Big East titles considering their sustained dominance of the sport, this is because they played in the American Athletic Conference (AAC) from 2014-2020. The Huskies have won the regular season title of whichever conference they were in since 2013 — which was the first year of four consecutive years where they won the NCAA National Championship.

The point being that UConn has not only dominated their conference but has been perennial championship contenders essentially every season this century. Still, Geno Auriemma asserted that he doesn't believe a championship is the sole goal for his program, which he conveyed when speaking with the media on Thursday.

"In 1985, our goal was to just make the Big East tournament. Just to be able to play a game in the Big East tournament," Auriemma said, per an X post from SNY. "And when we made the Big East tournament that very first year, we celebrated like we had accomplished something really really significant.

"And I don't want it to be 'Well, it's national championship or bust at UConn,' that winning regular season championships doesn't matter anymore, because it does matter," he continued. "And we've always made it matter. It has always been important to us.

"And it has taken its toll, trust me," he continued with a laugh.

While Big East titles clearly matter to Auriemma, he's surely still craving his first NCAA Championship since 2016.

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Grant Young
GRANT YOUNG

Grant Young covers Women’s Basketball, the New York Yankees, and the New York Mets for Sports Illustrated’s ‘On SI’ sites. He holds an MFA degree in creative writing from the University of San Francisco (USF), where he also graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree in Marketing and played on USF’s Division I baseball team for five years. However, he now prefers Angel Reese to Angels in the Outfield.

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