Daughter of Sparks Legend Shines for UConn in NCAA Championship Game
Paige Bueckers finally has her NCAA championship. Bueckers' University of Connecticut Huskies pasted the 2024 champion South Carolina Gamecocks in a non-competitive 82-59 title game blowout.
With the win, Connecticut head coach Geno Auriemma claimed his 12th NCAA Division I tournament championship, but his first since winning four straight from 2013-16. The eight-time Naismith Coach of the Year has added yet another notch to his Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame resume.
Bueckers — a three-time unanimous First Team All-American and the projected No. 1 pick in this spring's 2025 WNBA Draft — and Auriemma, however, weren't the story for the club's title.
PAIGE 🥲🥲🥲🥲 what a season. what a career. pic.twitter.com/21dxiUPZsR
— WNBA Clips & Highlights (@WNBAPlayerWatch) April 6, 2025
Nor was First Team All-Big East senior shooting guard Azzi Fudd.
That'd be 19-year-old freshman forward Sarah Strong, who scored 24 points on 10-of-15 field goal shooting, pulled down 15 rebounds, dished out five assists, blocked three shots, and swiped two steals. The 6-foot-2 behemoth stepped up when her squad needed it the most, and helped deliver an incredible complete game.
SARAH STRONG TODAY 🏆
— Women’s Hoops Network (@WomensHoops_USA) April 6, 2025
• 24 POINTS
• 15 REBOUNDS
• 5 ASSISTS
• 3 BLOCKS
• 2 STEALS
• 10/15 FG
NATIONAL CHAMPION!
pic.twitter.com/dWcpRiQb8a
Strong just happens to be second-generation basketball royalty.
She is the daughter of Danny Strong, a former North Carolina State hooper, and, more pertinently, Allison Feaster — a former early Los Angeles Sparks first-round draft pick.
Following a three-time Ivy League Player of the Year career at Harvard, the 5-foot-11 forward was selected with the No. 5 overall pick by the Sparks in the 1998 WNBA Draft.
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Feaster played alongside center Lisa Leslie on some decorated Sparks clubs, but was limited to a bench role during her tenure. Los Angeles fell in the Western Conference Finals in 1999 and 2000.
Feaster averaged 5.6 points on .401/.296/.771 shooting splits, 2.2 rebounds, 1.0 assists and 0.6 steals in 13.7 minutes a game across her three Sparks seasons.
That offseason, Feaster and center Clarisse Machanguana were traded to the Charlotte Sting for Rhonda Mapp and E.C. Hill. She lead the Sting to the 2001 WNBA Finals, where Charlotte fell to the Sparks.
Feaster became a two-way menace in Charlotte, finishing among the top seven vote recipients for Defensive Player of the Year three times. She was also the runner-up in Most Improved Player voting in 2001. Feaster was among the top five in made and attempted 3-pointers from 2001-03.
After sitting out the 2007 season, Feaster concluded her WNBA career with the Indiana Fever.
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Strong, an AP Second Team All-American and Third-Team USBWA All-American this year, has a bright future ahead of her. With Bueckers departing, she will become even more of a fulcrum in Auriemma's offense than she was this season.
Across 39 contests this season, she wraps up her debut NCAA run with averages of 16.2 points on .584/.383/.732 shooting splits, 8.7 rebounds, 3.5 assists and 1.6 blocks per bout. Her future looks bright.
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Currently also a scribe for Newsweek, Hoops Rumors, The Sporting News and "Gremlins" director Joe Dante's film site Trailers From Hell, Alex is an alum of Men's Journal, Grizzlies fan site Grizzly Bear Blues, and Bulls fan sites Blog-A-Bull and Pippen Ain't Easy, among others.