GO UCONN!!!!!

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2 Seed 3 Seed

UConn Huskies Indiana Hoosiers

75 58

Ok, admit it. After 8 minutes into the first quarter, UConn down 18-13, Paige on the bench after taking a fall and getting her knee taped, you all felt a little queasy. i wouldn't blame you.

Fortunately for me, we were in Niantic visiting my wife's sister and her husband and I didn't watch the game until I got home at 7:00. I do love fast forwarding through the commercials!!! I follwed the game on my phone using the ESPN gamecast but I didn't see what happened to Paige and I only checked in every 10-15 minutes so I didn't get a feel for the game flow.

For sure it was a slow start and a scary situation with Bueckers, at least for a minute. But UConn went on an 8-0 run to finish the quarter fueled by a three by Fudd, a traditional three point play by Christyn Williams on a strong drive to the basket and a put back by Nelson-Ododa.

The second quarter was more of a back and forth affair instead of the runs by each team in the first quarter. But the best part of the quarter was that Bueckers was back in the game. The second best part was the play of Caroina Ducharme, who hit a couple of baskets and made a great pass to Nelson-Ododa. Ali Patsberg kept Indiana in the game in the quarter but after a big three pointer for Fudd, the Huskies had a 35-26 point lead. It was 37-30 when Gulne hit a three pointer with 1 second on the clock to bring Indiana back to within 4 points at the half.

But just like the Huskie teams of old, UConn came out in the thrid quarter like a team possesed and put the game away with a 16-0 run to start the second half and with that 53-33 lead, the game was over. Just like that. Sure Indiana closed to to 13 points and then even 11 with 6 minutes left in the game. But that is to be expected. Indiana is a good team and an experienced team. They did a nice job knocking the lead down, but the Huskies seemed to have control of the game. They hit their free throws and on to the Elite game against North Carolina State they go.

Geno went with his gut on playing time and in this game he increased Ducharme's minutes a bit, Nika Muhl's as well and really reduced Dorka Juhasz's minutes to 3. He really trusted his starters and they all played 30+ minutes. He is the master. Whatever he did, it worked. Beating a really good Indiana team by 17 points. That is the bottom line.

With another game coming up on Monday, I don't want to do a full post game report. Just some quick points.

Four starters had double digits scoring and the other had 9 points.

Nelson-Ododa had a double double with 10 points and 14 rebounds. Edwards was one point short of her own double double with 9 points and 10 rebounds. Both players had 5 offensive rebounds each. That was HUGE.

Fudd is an amazing player. She doesn't just hit three pointers, she doesn't touch the net. She had 9 first half points before finishing with 13 points.

Williams was tied for the team lead in points with 15. She played strong in this game. She also grabbed 6 rebounds and had 3 assists.

The best news was that Bueckers played 33 minutes. She was aggressive with 15 points on 17 shots. Not that efficient, but she looked more like the old Paige than and game this season. And she was just intense during that third quarter 16-0 run.

The Huskies outrebounded Indiana 39-27 and 15-2 in offensive rebounds. It's the main reason they took 19 more shots than the Hoosiers.

After 3 turnovers in the first 2 minutes, UConn had only 6 turnovers in the last 38 minutes. That was a product of UConn taking care of the ball and Indiana not playing much pressure defense. It's not their style.

One more thing. It takes just as much defense as it does offense to go on a 16-0 run.

Even though I knew the result I really enjoyed watching the recording. It was worth the wait.

I think I did pretty well with my prediction for this game.

"k....Sweet Sixteen. UConn has had great success in this round, winning 27 out of their last 28 games. Can they do it again? I don't like them playing against another experienced team. The Hoosiers work really well together. However, If I did a player to play matchup, UConn would have the advantage at pretty much every position. It's not that Indiana is not talented. They are. But this is a really talented UConn team. Will the Huskies bounce back offensively from the horror show that was the UCF game? I would expect them to break 60 in this game. But the defense is where this game will be won and UConn is still playing their best defense of the season. I can't see Indiana scoring more than 50 points. I think Paige is ready to break out. Look for her to have a big game. Doing the math? UConn by 10+. I'm hoping for plenty on the plus side."

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UConn/Indiana Game Highlights

More Highlights

Geno Auriemma on UConn's offensive rebounding,

stellar defense, 3rd quarter surge

Full Postgame Interviews

Geno, Paige, Oliva and Christyn

More Geno Postgame Interview

Indiana Postgame Interviews starting at 40 minute mark

Olivia Postgame Interview

Paige Highlights

How great is it to be able to say that!!

Paige Postgame Interview

Indiana Postgame Show

Really Interesting take

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Geno Quotes

"I said to the kids in the locker room, ‘Man, when we’re playing like that, it really is fun to watch. It was really impressive to see us have so many people touch the ball and so many good things happen. And it looked like nothing was forced, nothing was rushed. Everything was just boom, boom, boom. It’s a coach’s dream. Fortunately, I’ve seen it a lot the last 20-something years, but this year I appreciate it more because it’s harder to come by.”

“You know, Monday night we played a team, UCF, that’s experienced as hell and been together a long time. Today, we played a team that’s experienced as hell and has been together a long time. Now this Monday night, we’ve got a team that’s won three straight ACC Tournaments, and they’ve been together a long time. There’s no breathers in this tournament, and there shouldn’t be, either. When you’re playing to go to the Final Four, it should be a real, real, real hard game. And this game [against NC State] is as hard as any final eight game that I can remember.”

“Unfortunately some people need a lot of minutes to be effective. But unfortunately in the NCAA Tournament, you don’t have time. Everyone has a role on our team, and it depends on what night, what your role is going to be that night, which is what I really like.”

“Monday was a huge reminder to our team. That, yo, this is how things go. You don’t just roll in, have a conversation with the other team and go, ‘What do you want the score to be tonight? At UConn, we’ve made it look easy enough times that the expectation sometimes is, ‘Why isn’t this easy tonight?’”

“I actually thought making the NCAA Tournament was in jeopardy. Because you never know when you’re ever going to get back to having more than six or seven players. It just seemed like, ‘This is it. This is what it’s going to be the rest of the season. You’ve got six or seven healthy players, max.’ But little by little we got everybody back. We started playing real well. We got contributions from a ton of people. And, you know, here we are. Our players sitting in that locker room have a lot of tradition on their backs. And sometimes, that’s enough to carry you.”

“During that stretch, there was a look about us that we felt exceptionally confident. We knew exactly where we were going. We knew where the ball was going. We knew where the shots were coming from. We could pick and choose which shots we wanted to take, and we got more lay-ups than we had gotten in the previous two quarters.”

“We’re at our best when we’re going up and down the floor. You’ve got to get easy buckets and we managed that do that.”

“I thought we did an amazing job defensively. I thought that was the difference in the game, that we were able to get the stops that we needed.”

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Follow along and view the Group standings

Doggy's Doghouse and the password is doggydaddy.

Just click on the link.

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Time and TV

Bridgeport Region

Total Mortgage Arena

Bridgeport, CT

No. 1 North Carolina State 66 No. 5 Notre Dame 63

No. 2 UConn 75 No. 3 Indiana 58

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Wichita Region

Intrust Bank Arena

Wichita, KS

No. 1 Louisville 76 No. 4 Tennessee 64

No. 3 Michigan 52 No. 10 South Dakota 49

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Bridgeport Region

Total Mortgage Arena

Bridgeport, CT

No. 1 North Carolina State vs No. 2 UConn

Monday, March 28th, 7:00 PM ESPN

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Wichita Region

Intrust Bank Arena

Wichita, KS

No. 1 Lousville vs No. 3 Michigan

Monday, March 28th, 9:00 PM ESPN

Greensboro Region

Greensboro Coliseum

Greenboro, NC

No. 1 South Carolina vs No. 10 Creighton

Sunday, 3/27th 7:00 PM ESPN

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Spokane Region

Spokane Memorial Arena

Spokane, WA

No. 1 Stanford vs No. 2 Texas

Sunday, 3/27th 9:00 PM ESPN

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Straight from the Dog

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I'm not sure this particular UConn fan could be any happier. The Huskies won, Notre Dame lost and Tennessee lost. Awesome!

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5 Seed Notre Dame lost to 1 Seed North Carolina State 66-63 in the worst possible way. The Irish were up for 39 minutes and 44 seconds of the game. Notre Dame had two big leads in the fourth quarter but each time, the Wolfpack was able to claw their way back. The Irish had the ball and a one point lead with 29 seconds remainining in the game. The ball went to Dara Mabrey and as she tried to spin away from the defender, Perez was able tip the ball away and she went untoughed to the basket for the one point lead for North Carolina State. It was there first lead of the game. Westbrook missed a three pointer, Perez was fouled and the game was over. Now the Wolfpack gets to play UConn with a chance to get to the Final Four.

I'm sure most UConn fans remember the Mabrey family and their 3 sister history against UConn. If anyone was going to lose the game for ND, I'm glad it was her. And why didn't the coach get the ball in the hands of their best ball handler in Miles? Some bad coaching.

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4 Seed Tennessee lost to 1 Seed Louisville 76-64 in a game that was closer than the final margin. The Lady Vols did their best, but it was a typical game for them. They only shot 36.4% from the field, 5-21 on threes and only 11-19 from the free throw line. And as usual, they had 18 turnovers. Rae Burrell had a nice farewell game for Tennessee with 22 points. She will be a first round draft pick in the WNBA draft. Louisville met every Tennessee run with a run of their own and never let the game get away from them. The Cardinals were led by their dynamic duo, Engstler with and Van Lith with 23 points, going 9-10 from the free throw line. They will meet 3 seed Michigan in the Elite Eight.

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In a low scoring but exciting game, 3 Seed Michigan was able to squeek by 10 Seed South Dakota 52-49. It was just a battle the entire game and it was going to come to the last woman standing. That was the Wolverines. Just a shout out to the Coyotes. Great job this season.

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David sometimes texts me some great stuff right after the game.

Today was the 96th straight time that UConn beat a team team they were playing for the first time. Last time UConn lost in that situation was in January of 1996. Amazing.

Think the refs started calling the game differently in the second half?

First half fouls called - 9

Third quarter fouls called - 10

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Well, good luck to the SEC. Now former coach of the Central Florida Bullies Katie Abrahamson-Henderson is moving on. She has been hired by the Georgia Bulldogs. This is certainly a great hire for Georgia. Love her or hate her, she coaches a winning style and in the rough and tumble SEC, she will be fitting right in. It might be fun to finally root for her, especially when she plays Tennessee.

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By David in Naples

Very nice win by UConn over a talented Indiana team. Stats are as follows:

1. The 17 point margin of victory is twice the margin in the previous 5 Sweet Sixteen games.
2. As predicted, rebounding was key. UConn on top 39-27. IU only 2 offensive boards.
3. Indiana’s 15 turnovers also were key for the victory.
4. The Huskies took 67 shots, IU only 48.
5. Bench scoring = UConn 13, Indiana 1.
6. Indiana had only 4 assists, 15 turnovers.
7. The Huskies’ bench played 40 minutes. IU bench only 24...

Next up is NC State, winners over Notre Dame...😁

Stats II

Margin of victory comparison:

1. SC vs NC = 8
2. Stanford vs Maryland = 6
3. Texas vs OSU = 3
4. Creighton vs Iowa St = 8
5. NC State vs ND = 3
6. L’Ville vs Tenn. = 12
7. Michigan vs SD = 3

8. UConn vs Indiana = 17

Go Huskies..!

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