Wednesday, April 07, 2010

UCONN Women Repeat As National Champions...NYY 6 Red Sox 4

The University of Connecticut women Huskies won their second consecutive national championship with a comeback 53-47 victory over Stanford. They had to do it the tough way because their first-half shooting was non-existant. They were only able to score 12 (!!) points in that first 20 minutes, their lowest scoring half in the program's history. EVER! Stanford's touch was not that much better because of UCONN's swarming defense but UCONN clearly needed to put some balls through the net in the second stanza. It was 21-12 at the half. Here's the best player in the country, Maya Moore, on what they were thinking at halftime...

"It was a new half," Moore said. "We had to just keep playing hard and executing what we didn't execute in the first half. Sometimes it's just that simple. You just have to focus in on the little things that we've been working on all year and things start clicking."

Connecticut has now won 78 straight games, 10 short of UCLA's John Wooden's all-time record. But 5 seniors will bid adieu and the team will be different next year. But they'll STILL have Maya. The score was Stanford 21-UCONN 12 and then it was time for the Maya Moore show. She scored 18 points in the last 20 minutes and along with a couple timely threes from Caroline Doty and a nice effort from UCONN center and AP player of the year Tina Charles, who could only have been helped by another ankle injury to Stanford center Jayne Appel, UCONN went ahead for good. Quite simply, Maya was unstoppable. She put the team on her back and carried them on her shoulders to make history. And that's exactly what they did. Here's Coach Geno Auriemma speaking of the 77 game winning streak and the two consecutive national championships. He'll be the next USA women's Olympic basketball coach, where I think he and his players will take the gold. I know one thing for sure. The United States of America will fall in love with him. We here in Connecticut sure did, many years ago. Excellence unbounded, right in front of our eyes. I have to admit this. I shed a few tears last night. My girlfriend gave me some s*it about it but I didn't care. I think it's good never to hide your emotions. Hey, they were tears of unbridled happiness. There's nothing wrong with that. Here's Geno...

"Looking back now at what we've done I'm almost incredulous that it actually happened because I can't imagine having done it," Auriemma said. "It's almost like it never happened. It's something that's there and I know we did it, and I know it's in the record books. But I am so astounded that it's happened."

Thanks for everything, coach. We'll see you at the parade in Hartford whenever it happens and at the reception at the airport and the celebration on campus this afternoon.

Briefly, the New York Yankees defeated the Boston Red Sox last night by a score of 6-4. The Sox were ahead 3-1 but could not hold that advantage. To tell you the truth, I didn't see a minute of it. It was a University of Connecticut night for all of us here in Connecticut. I do want to give you a link to the Boston Globe's outspoken Dan Shaughnessy, who comes to way too many premature conclusions about our 2010 Boston Red Sox after only two regular season games. Click on that title and as always, BE WELL. Congratulations to the University of Connecticut women Huskies!!! You own my heart. I love ya! SO MUCH.

2 Comments:

At 4/08/2010 5:50 AM, Blogger Peter N said...

I was busy having a heart attack! I'm, of course, over-dramatizing but NOTHING WOULD FALL THROUGH THE HOOP!!! They came out in the second half with fire in their eyes. I loved t! Thanks for your great comment.

 
At 4/08/2010 5:52 AM, Blogger Peter N said...

My bad on the spelling!

 

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