WASHINGTON — This was a night about Dan Hurley and Alex Karaban in the huddle, facing the possibility it could be their last moment together like this.
“I refuse to lose and will really do anything to help this team win,” Karaban said. “The main thing in the huddle that really struck with me is Coach saying, ‘Go out there and fire, have no regrets at the end of this.’ That just really stuck with me.”
This was a night, more than a thousand miles away, about Sarah Strong working the locker room at halftime, perhaps coming into her own as a leader, distributing high fives and telling her teammates, “We’re good … we’re good.” The pressure and the burden suddenly lifted from their shoulders.
This was a night about UConn basketball delivering again in March, a night both the men’s and women’s teams won to reach the NCAA’s elite round of eight remaining teams. It was a night when the only school to win national championships in both in the same season kept alive the dream they’d do it a third time. Next up, both face longtime rivals on Sunday, the Duke men and the Notre Dame women, to get to the Final Four.
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This was a night we needed, so we could all but ignore the ever-smug and condescending NBA commissioner Adam Silver, who got his way, completing his machinations to maneuver the WNBA’s Connecticut Sun away from the state that loves the women’s game like no other, abandoning to entire region.
ESPN reported what has long been inevitable, once the ink dried on the WNBA’s new collective bargaining agreement with players. The Mohegan Tribe, blocked from selling the franchise to interests that would have kept the team in Hartford, or moved it to Boston, will sell it instead — reportedly for $25 million less — to the NBA franchise owners in Houston, where one of the league’s original franchises went belly up years ago despite multiple championships.
Connecticut helped keep that league afloat for 20 years when no one was watching, so the lack of loyalty is appalling enough, the restraint of trade is sketchy enough. It doesn’t make much sense as a business decision, either.
The good news is, the state does not have to give Silver or his two leagues the satisfaction of crying over it. There will be time to mourn before they back up the trucks and pull out of Uncasville. This is March and UConn is not going away, literally or figuratively, so we can give the WNBA a preview of the apathy it will likely face upon returning to Houston.
UConn men’s basketball holds on for 67-63 Sweet 16 win over Michigan State
This is UConn’s time.
When the men took the court at Capital One Arena in D.C. and the women in Fort Worth on Friday night, they faced “power conference” schools flush with cash from their billion-dollar football TV deals, the kind of programs that were supposed to put UConn out of the championship business a decade ago. Maybe old traditions don’t matter so much in college athletics anymore, but UConn keeps the fire burning for Connecticut.
Karaban stayed in one place all four years of college, won championships his first two, and now pursues one he can cherish as captain. Teammates were making shots early, as the Huskies raced out to a 25-6 lead. Slowly, Michigan State ground down the lead and briefly led by one.
Karaban hit a killer 3-point shot with 1:39 to play to restore the lead to four, then hit two free throws. Tarris Reed Jr., another senior, kicked the ball out to Karaban for that 26-foot shot, taken with resolve. And though he often struggles at the free throw line, Reed went 4-for-4 in the final minute to lock down the Huskies’ 67-63 win.
“That’s what this time of year is all about,” Hurley said. “You’ve got to have great upperclassmen. You have to have great juniors, great seniors, veteran players that are not going to blink and just can handle the pressure of the moment and also can bounce back from maybe a stretch. AK was able to make that in-game adjustment. I don’t know how many shots he’d taken at halftime. My message to him is, if you’re going to go out in this tournament, you’ve got to go out on your shield. You’ve got to go out firing, or you’re going to have a lot of regrets.”
UConn women’s basketball survives ugly start to beat North Carolina 63-42, advance to Elite Eight
Karaban had to have the courage to take that deep 3-pointer with the game, season and his career on the line. He took it and he made it, and the Huskies are still in pursuit of championship No. 7, the Final Four to be played in Indianapolis.
There wasn’t as much drama for the women, as there rarely is lately. But North Carolina made things a little tougher than expected, leading after a quarter, staying close until nearly halftime. Strong, just a sophomore, is winning national player of the year awards seemingly every day, and being the best player carries with it the responsibility of leading. Her play always speaks volumes, she occasionally must verbalize it.
“I’ve gotten more comfortable with being able to use my voice and being confident,” Strong told reporters in the locker room, “knowing that sometimes I do know what I’m talking about, and I know that my team can use that.”
Report: Connecticut Sun sold for $300 million, will relocate to Houston in 2027
On a night when UConn was struggling to shoot, they stole the ball 15 times and, in so doing, won 63-42. Now they face Notre Dame, one of the few programs in the country that has interrupted the Huskies’ 30-year dominance of women’s basketball. In mid-January, UConn beat Notre Dame by 37 points. Now only the Fighting Irish stand between UConn and the Final Four in Phoenix, where they could play for their 13th title.
This all means that Sunday — when both teams try to take the last step to the Final Four, the summit of the sport — could be an even more glorious day, another of those March memories that can never be bought, sold or stolen from Connecticut.
