Wings GM Shares Advice UConn's Geno Auriemma Gave Regarding Paige Bueckers

The Dallas Wings drafting Paige Bueckers with the No. 1 pick of the 2025 WNBA Draft marked the end of an era. Of course, this era was Bueckers' five seasons spent playing for Geno Auriemma with the UConn Huskies.

This dynamic duo's time together was always going to come to an end, and there was no better time for them to part ways than after UConn won the 2025 NCAA national championship. Still, it's sad to know that Auriemma will never again be Bueckers' head coach.

"[Paige Bueckers'] journey has been the most incredible for any kid I've had."

Geno Auriemma spoke on how Paige Bueckers compares to the great UConn players he's coached 👏 pic.twitter.com/1ATpFA9qxK
— espnW (@espnW) April 6, 2025

Although this doesn't necessarily mean that the lessons he learned and then shared about coaching the Wings' new superstar won't be adopted by her new franchise. This was conveyed by Dallas' Executive Vice-President and General Manager Curt Miller during his April 25 appearance on No Offseason: The Athletic Women's Basketball Show.

"I think the thing that Geno shares — and he will share it in press conferences — is that you've gotta live with her, because she's so intelligent, you've got to live with some of the gambling that she does," Miller said. "He shared some stories that, instead of locking and trailing, attacking and tracing a great player off of a screen, she shoots a gap to go make a momentum-changing steal in a game. And sometimes it doesn't always work out.

"You, as a coach, have to live with it because you know that she understands that she was calculating... so his advice for me to pass along to [Wings coach] Chris [Koclanes] is 'You're gonna have to deal with some of the gambling; that she may break the game plan. But most of the time, she's making a good decision,'" Miller added.

While Auriemma may have learned this about Bueckers the hard way, at least he gave the Wings a fair warning.

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