Women’s March Madness takeaways: UConn more than just Paige Bueckers

UConn players celebrate with their trophy after defeating Baylor in a college basketball game in the Elite Eight round. (Eric Gay/AP)

Manning vs. Brady, Ali vs. Frasier, Serena vs. Venus… Clark vs. Bueckers? Okay, maybe they are not quite on that level yet, but one day they very well could be.

It was billed as the marquee matchup, one promising to start off the NCAA women’s tournament Sweet 16 with a bang. The Iowa Hawkeyes’ Caitlin Clark versus the UConn Huskies’ Paige Bueckers. The ultimate showdown. And while the much anticipated heavyweight tilt between the two freshman phenoms did not disappoint per se - Bueckers had 18 while Clark dropped 21 - it was the Huskies’ other stars who really stole the show.

Christyn Williams led the way with 27, Canadian Aaliyah Edwards added 18, while Evina Westbrook chipped in with a casual 17. Bueckers and Clark did their things, but it was the difference between the two 19-year-olds’ teammates that became very apparent as the game wore on.

Geno Auriemma’s Huskies are loaded with talent, possessing multiple players capable of taking over any given game. On the flip side, the Hawkeyes were going to need Clark to be flawless if they were going to take out the No. 1 seed, an especially daunting task going up against excellent perimeter defenders such as Williams.

UConn hounded Clark all night, constantly denying her the ball, and forcing her to shoot just 7-of-21 from the field, on the way to a comfortable 92-72 win.

Bueckers, or more accurately UConn, won the first installment in the matchup of the two budding superstars, proving that basketball is still a team game after all.

Here are some more takeaways from the Sweet 16 and Elite 8 rounds of the Women’s NCAA Tournament:

One of these things is not like the other

The casual fan knows about the dynastic Huskies program, who Auriemma has on their way to a 13th straight (yes, you read that right, 13th!) Final Four.

Then you have the No. 1 overall seed Stanford Cardinals, who under the tutelage of the great Tara VanDerveer, are in their 34th consecutive women’s NCAA tournament. Led by All-American guard Kiana Williams, the traditional women’s basketball powerhouse will be hoping to raise the trophy for the first time since 1992.

South Carolina and Dawn Staley are no slouches either, winning the program's first-ever title back in 2017. Since she took over in 2008, Staley has created a winning culture with the Gamecocks, and it starts on the defensive end.

During their Elite 8 matchup, South Carolina held the Texas Longhorns to just 34 total points in 40 minutes, including a complete shutout in the fourth quarter. That is the first time a team has held an opponent scoreless in a quarter in the history of the NCAA Women’s Tournament.

Three schools that have all tasted the Final Four before, and then one who hasn’t.

The Arizona Wildcats, a third-seed, will be making their first Final Four appearance in program history.

Arizona coach Adia Barnes has senior guard Aari McDonald leading the way for her squad, as McDonald put up 64 points combined in the Wildcats’ wins over Texas A&M and Indiana.

Arizona’s reward for making the Final Four? A date with UConn. The team that has never been to a Final Four, taking on the squad that has been there the most.

But the good thing for the Wildcats -- and the one thing we really love about March -- is anything can happen.

Foul or no foul?

It was arguably the game of the year in women’s college basketball. The Elite 8 matchup between 2019 champs, the Baylor Bears, and UConn, lived up to the hype.

In fact, it was the most watched women’s college basketball game outside of the Final Four in a decade, drawing in 1.703 million viewers.

The game was a back-and-forth affair all night, coming right down to the final buzzer, and ending with a controversial no-call heard, or more precisely, not heard around the basketball world.

Down one with six seconds left, Baylor’s senior forward DiJonai Carrington drove left looking to tie the game. Her shot from the left baseline was tightly contested by two UConn defenders, including some clear contact, but there was no whistle on the play, and the Huskies held on for a two-point win.

After the game, Carrington took to Twitter to let her feelings on the no-call be known.

She wasn’t alone, either. A certain well-known figure in men’s basketball also agreed that it should have been a foul.

Unfortunately for Baylor fans, even LeBron James does not have the power to overturn a call, and the Bears will have to wait until next year to try and get back to the Final Four.

Canadians still dancing

Fear not basketball fans from the Great White North, each Final Four team has one Canadian-born player on their roster.

The four:

• Aaliyah Edwards, UConn
• Laeticia Amihere, South Carolina
• Alyssa Jerome, Stanford
• Shaina Pellington, Arizona

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